


A Grimm Visit

by akuma_river



Series: Werewolves and Hunters and Wesen and Grimms, Oh My! [1]
Category: Grimm (TV), Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-07-09
Updated: 2013-05-18
Packaged: 2017-11-09 11:32:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 40,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/454975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akuma_river/pseuds/akuma_river
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles penchant for trouble shows itself when his father takes him to Portland to get him out of Beacon Hills  while he works a case with Portland PD. Unfortunately for Stiles Portland has thousands of Wesen and he can see them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this idea off and on since I found Grimm and then found Teen Wolf. It just seems like an awesome blending to bring the two of them together. 
> 
> I'm not sure where I am going with this. I just had this idea and it wouldn't die and I read another fic on Ao3 that was the first crossover of these fandoms and my idea just got bigger in my mind. So here it is.
> 
> Canon for Teen Wolf up to S2 E2 and Mid-somewhere season 1 for Grimm.
> 
>  
> 
>  ~~Fyi, I'm solo on this with no beta so any mistakes you spot or suggestions you have will be greatly appreciated.~~  
>  I have a beta, Anna, I'm re-editing the first four chapters (nothing big has changed, just grammar things).
> 
> Enjoy the show.

It was the Isaac Lahey case that was the straw that broke the camel's back. Finding Stiles in the room with a knocked out guy, who had a broken arrow in his leg dressed in a deputy's uniform, while the door to the isolated jail cell was busted open, was what sent Sheriff Stilinski over the edge. It didn't matter the story that Stiles came up with on the fly about what happened. Stiles was lying and they both knew it; but the truth was probably some conglomeration of events that would be too unbelievable to even think about accepting as the truth and so he just officially accepted it and went on.

Except he didn't. 

It was eating at him, at the back of his mind, all of the things that Stiles has been involved with in the past couple of months. Lydia's mauling, the hunt at the high school, Derek Hale being a serial killer and then not and back again, twice, not to mention the whole ditching the first lacrosse game that Stiles would be first string in. He still didn't understand that. 

Nothing fit. Some other parent would think it was just a teenager acting out, but he wasn't some other parent. He was Stiles Stilinski's father and he was also the Sheriff of Beacon Hills. He knew somewhere in his gut that all of these events were connected to each other. He didn't have any real idea how they were he just knew they were. Call it a cop's intuition but he _knew_ Stiles and his friends were deep in the mess with the bodies. 

It was his father's intuition that was telling him that Stiles was going to be in danger, if he wasn't already. It was this itch at the back of his throat that he picked up since the high school hunt incident. He still didn't know what to believe about that. Stiles and Scott told him it was Derek Hale but Derek Hale was cleared of everything. In addition to fabrication of a statement the damage to the school didn't really fit with what a single human could do. Not to mention there was still no explanation for why the boys and their friends were being chased throughout the school in the middle of the night.

Then there was the enigma wrapped in a riddle of how Katherine Argent ended up in Hale's burnt-out childhood home with her throat torn out and Derek Hale's uncle's burned body towards the front of house by the woods. It was still something that could not be explained fully. Not with the physical evidence they obtained. How did Kate Argent's throat get ripped out like that? The amount of force concentrated on the windpipe to be able to physically rip it out without damaging any other part of the neck is something that no normal human could possibly do. Not with just their fingers, which is what the medical examiner said was the culprit.

The idea that Peter Hale was somehow able to do it was just too preposterous to even think about accepting but they had no other suspects and the physical evidence that they found seemed to lead to that direction. 

Some of the deputies think he was probably hopped up on some drugs like PCP or those "bath salts" that cause excited delirium. The video of some of those arrests still send chills down his spine. But preliminary reports do not show anything of that sort in the blood from Peter Hale's burnt body. In addition, is the knowledge that, before disappearing from his hospital room and winding up somehow killing Argent and being burnt to death, he was in a catatonic state for six years. His muscles should have shown signs of entropy but there was no evidence of that either.

Nothing was making sense. It was still early in the investigation and there was still the forensics and testing to be done but Sheriff Stilinski knew nothing would change. Officially Argent will take the rap for all of the mysterious animal attacks and Peter Hale will take the rap for killing Argent. As for how he burnt to death the closest that another can figure is self-immolation, basically he killed himself.

Why and how are still to be debated, but officially everything is wrapped up in a neat little bow and he knows that the case will be closed. 

What really gets to him is that he knows in some fashion that Stiles was involved in that one as well. The fact that Argent's niece is or was dating Scott only cements that factor. Officially he can't prove anything, yet. 

Clawing from inside of him is this feeling that one day he is going to come across a body that Stiles or his friends put there and he knows he will have to follow the law and do his job. What haunts him though is the deeper set intuition that tells him that Stiles might be one of those bodies himself; his thirst for adventure going too far and being involved in something at the wrong place at the wrong time. 

He already lost his wife he does not want to lose his only child as well. Sheriff Stilinski doesn't think he would ever be able to fully recover if he lost Stiles as well. He knows that Stiles feels the same.

Which is why when the call came that Portland had a case that might be tied to a cold case of theirs, that Sheriff Stilinski volunteered to take the evidence and personally work with the officer in charge of the case. It is rare for the Sheriff himself or herself to go to another city just to exchange information but Sheriff Stilinski was the one in charge of the case and knew the most about it. So it was not without precedent to go there since the Portland PD detective in charge of the case in question would not be coming to Beacon Hills.

Sheriff Stilinski felt it was something that his son would call kismet. Here he was looking for a reason to get Stiles out of Beacon Hills where bodies now seem to be dropping every week by strange and unexplained animal attacks and Portland PD calls up looking for information on a cold case that the Sheriff had been in charge of when he was a deputy. 

Whatever awaited them in Portland could not be worse than what was going on in Beacon Hills. Just a few days with his son, out of town, doing trivial information exchange is all he needs to get recharged and handle what seems to be becoming a normal acquaintance in his town, more bodies.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, it looks like it will be another chapter before they get to Portland. All I wanted was the first sentence and then Stiles said no that there had to be more to explain why he gave he up the argument and to set up for what is to come. Stiles won, as he usually does.
> 
> P.S. Don't expect quick updates like this all the time. I'm just in the writing mood and your comments gave me enough incentive to work on this last night and today.

They leave in the morning, bright at dawn, Stiles had put up a fight the night before but finally gave in. He had a feeling what brought this all on and what exactly his dad was hoping would happen. 

But he didn't want to leave while _things_ were happening. 

Stiles may not be buff or brawn or super-strong but he has _skills_. He does. Didn't they know that they needed Stiles' awesome research skills? Not to mention his unbelievable way to break the tension in the room with one of his foot in mouth techniques. Okay, sometimes it makes things worse, but usually it causes a non sequitur to take place and bemusement and befuddlement fill his opponents face; often to the point that they forget what they were yelling about or any violence they were about to perform. Unless, they are like Derek and just tell him to shut up and get back on point. Verbal vomit...or inducement of verbal explosion, that's what he should call it. It's a _skill_ not as cool as some skills like being able to pick up a car with one hand and toss it, but still for a normal human, it is an awesome _skill_ , emphasis most definitely included.

Still, Stiles knows what his dad is doing. He knows this is about the Isaac Lahey thing and the fact that he's been catching Stiles and Scott near his crime-scenes and causing mischief. His dad is worried. Stiles can tell. It's not like he can tell his dad to not worry because Scott is now a werewolf and super-strong and Stiles has already been threatened with life and limb a hundred times and been in the presence of real psychopaths, that he knows he can handle whatever life throws at him. He talked down 'crazy as a bag of cannibal cats' Peter Hale from killing him and/or biting him. Now that was pure _skills_. Stiles wonders if he can use that for college applications to show immense calm in the presence of crazy and life-endangering incidents. 

Nope, he just can't tell his dad. It's not just the fact that it is _so_ out of the realm of possibility but also he knows his dad will freak out. Not only about werewolves and hunters and all those _bodies_ that somehow keep dropping in his town, but also because his son is in the middle of it all. His precious only child, the only family that his father has left in the world, is in the middle of a supernatural _war-zone_. Emphasis most definitely needed to show how damn crazy and very very bad this all is. 

Yeah, that won't send his dad over the crazy hill and have him quit his job and move them across the planet to get away from the supernatural stuff to protect his only son, at all. Nope, that's just what any sane rational parent would do when their child is faced with immense danger from something they can't comprehend. Or just what Stiles would do. 

Stiles can just imagine it. He will be the 'helicopter protective over the nth degree' parent. His kid or kids, maybe a boy and a girl – he will love to have a little brainy girl, just like Lydia – would already be out of school and off to a private boarding school the moment he caught them in danger. A nice one with armed guards and security checks and more secure than Fort Knox. 

Derek, he can imagine, would be the military parent. The one who teaches the kids about danger and how to protect themselves and then sends them off to safety the moment it comes. Sure, he wouldn't be as bad as Stiles in the over protectiveness since he wouldn't send across the planet to some foreign school with ex-military mercenaries being the security guards of the most precious children on earth. But he can imagine him locking them down in a panic room with weapons to protect themselves.

Scott, though, would be a horrible parent. Just plain awful. The way he is oblivious to danger and not able to read between the lines and stuff. He would let his kids get away with murder if they pull the puppy-dog eyes on him. Good thing he has Allison or else they would turn out as spoiled as Jackson. 

Stiles really needs to stop this train of thought because then he is going to wonder who will be the mommy to his kids. And as much as he think Lydia will be the most badass parent of them all, genius and HBIC as she is, he doesn't think she will be the mommy to his kids and that makes him a little sad. He wanted little girls with red hair and brainy brainy smarts with a wicked and viperous tongue and little boys with dark hair and green eyes that shine blue when angry and...

Green eyes? Green eyes? Lydia doesn't have green eyes. Neither does Stiles.

…

So, yeah he understands why his dad is packing them up and going for the hills. Fighting him even further on this will just make him suspicious and while his cop intuition will be nowhere close to the truth he doesn't want to bring his dad anywhere near to what it could be. He doesn't even want to imagine what his dad will do when he finds out that Stiles knows who Derek Hale is – not just a name and a face but actually knows him – and has been in close and personal contact with said Derek Hale and has helped him break the law a few times. Yep, that will not go over very well.

Grounded for life and possibly shipped out to military school, _not very well_. 

He had called Scott that night to let him know that his dad was kidnapping him for a few days to a week and that he needed Allison to take notes for him. As much as Stiles loves Scott and would do anything for him he would not trust him to take notes for him. There is a reason why Scott is failing a couple of his classes or near to failing them. Stiles is unsure how bad the grades actually are but Scott won't tell him so he lets it go. Still, Stiles will not let Scott take his notes. He needs his good grades, even if only to prove to his father that nothing bad is going on with Stiles and his somehow coincidental connections to crime-scenes and dead mutilated bodies.

The drive is long and arduous and they took Jess – he named his Jeep so what, everyone and everything deserves to have a name, especially those things that belongs to Stiles – as Stiles' dad's vehicle was the Sheriff's SUV. Not exactly prudent or wise to drive to another state in a cop car. They ask questions about that. So Jess it was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is it canon or fanon that Stiles named his Jeep Jess?


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I totally feel that I'm not portraying Stiles as Stiles. I just don't think I can capture the Stilesness of him. 
> 
> I could have probably made the first few chapters into one long first one, but it's been awhile since I wrote and I'm posting as I'm writing. 
> 
> The plan is to make this long and canonically acceptable up to current episodes on Teen Wolf. Not everything will be the same, but the major events should be here. I'm hoping to get this up to the end of season 1 of Grimm but that depends on where season 2 of Teen Wolf will end. I think it will go AU from end of season 2 and catch up with Grimm and from there go AU as well.
> 
> So you guys are in for a long haul. Just keep up the comments and I should be able to find time to write this. This story just won't go away in my mind. I have most of mapped out but it's the getting it from mind to paper in an acceptable form that is proving the troublesome aspect. Dialogue is not my forte.

It was day one of what Stiles was calling _The Kidnapping_. Just because it was legal since his father was his only guardian alive and Stiles was still a minor doesn't mean that being taken without permission is not kidnapping. He was only cooperating with his kidnapper so as to be let go sooner. It is what his dad taught him, cooperate with the bad guy to earn their trust and keep an eye out for an opening to escape and/or hurt them. Typically the escape part was emphasized as the one to choose. 

Stiles is as always an apt learner when it suits him. He perfected the art of feigned cooperation so as to prepare oneself for running like hell once their guard is down. Many a bully can attest to that and Peter Hale, except he can't since he is dead, well the Argents when they kidnapped him and Jackson could, and then there is Derek. But Derek was different, it wasn't kidnapping it was more along the lines of forced imprisonment between his bulging arms and the walls he was thrust upon, repeatedly and then he would be dragged off to help Derek do whatever was needed to save their skins and Scott's. 

So here Stiles was sitting in Jess listening to crappy music his dad was playing and being driven insane by the mind numbing boredom eclipsing him. He already took an Adderall and his dad was watching him like a hawk so it is not like he could pop another one. 

It's not his fault that his mind was always going at super fast speeds and he had all these thoughts in his head. It wouldn't be so bad if he could work on his laptop but it was in his bag in the back and the few times he stared wistfully at it his dad glared at him. A sharp _no_ in those cold dark mean eyes. 

This is punishment. This is torture. And it is all Stiles' fault. He knows that his dad is taking joy in doing this to him. He can see it in the soft little smile his lips twitch into every once in awhile but especially when Stiles glances to his bag with the laptop.

Stiles brought some books to read while he is stuck on this kidnapping slash father/son bonding trip. He wished he could drag them out and read them but he thought his father might object to the subject material. Books on the supernatural would be sure to get his father's attention and that might cause him to think back on the past few months strange happenings in Beacon Hills and that was _not_ something Stiles wanted. So Stiles was stuck listening to the crappy music and being driven insane by the mind numbing boredom eclipsing his brain.

Anymore of this and he could understand why Sherlock Holmes shot his wall up while on a four-patch problem. Was it a four-patch? Maybe it was a three-patch? Who cares, all Stiles wanted was to get out of the vehicle and get access to some internet or at least a TV. A TV with cable. Or even better a TV with a satellite hook-up.

Stiles starts to fidget in his seat. He starts to tap out a random pattern on his jean clothed knee as he tries to do something _anything_ to stop the noise in his head that keeps him from being able to sit still and enjoy the passing scenery. He keeps at this, fidget, tap, fidget, tap, tap, fidget, fidget, tap; unaware of his own movements. His dad glances at him from the side and then ignores Stiles' movements. It would be easier to strap Stiles down than for Stiles to consciously take control of his own body and keep it still.

Tap, fidget, twitch, tap, tap, tap, fidget, twitch, fidget...

Stiles' movements become more frenzied as he grows increasingly bored and unable to keep still in the seat. The fact that he has nothing to occupy his mind, either music he enjoys, his laptop, or even a book causes his boredom to directly affect his fidgeting and twitching and tapping as his body tries to find something to relieve the tension in him.

Thinking enough time has passed since his last outburst and/or question and answering session to relieve boredom and desperately needing a distraction Stiles fidgets in his seat and turns to his dad. Puppydog eyes locked and loaded he asks, "Dad?"

Stiles' dad ignores him. Stiles does not like this. Stiles does not like to be ignored at all especially when he is bored and needing a distraction."Daaaad?"

His dad continues to ignore him. Stiles doesn't think it's fair for his dad to ignore him when his dad caused him to be this way in the first place by kidnapping and taking him on this father/son bonding slash work trip thingamajig. "Daaaaaad!?"

Annoyed, his dad _finally_ turns to Stiles and glares at him speaking tersely, "What, Stiles?"

Stiles' lips quirk as he says, "Are we there yet?" 

"No, Stiles. How many times are you going to ask that?"

Stiles thinks this is a perfectly good question since he wasn't the one who decided to go on this trip. He was taken against his will across state lines. Petulantly Stiles says, "As many times as it takes until we get there. _You_ were the one who decided to kidnap me and take me to another _state_." Stiles starts to really get into his lecture and speaks at a fast pace, "It's not my fault I can't have access to my laptop or something to keep me occupied. You won't let me take another pill and it's not like I can _control_ my A.D.H.D. tendencies that make it impossible for me to sit –"

There is only so much that a person can stand a hyped up Stiles while being stuck in an enclosed space with him and his father had passed that point a few hours back. "Stiles, _shut up_."

Stiles sends his dad a hurt/insulted/'how rude' look and turns back in his seat pouting. It's not his fault. He has a _medical condition_. Lots of people have it. Famous people have. It is associated with genius. Tony Stark most definitely has it. It's not something to be disparaged. Stiles feels he's being discriminated against. And by his own father! 

Stiles stares out his jeep window and wonders what everyone else is doing. Maybe he should text Scott. It should be close to the time that school gets out. They have been in his precious most wonderful jeep for hours upon hours now and only had a few pit stops for snack food and bathroom breaks. Why aren't they there yet!?

Stiles can hear his dad take a deep breath. "Just about an hour more. It depends on the traffic but we should be getting there soon."

Stiles smiles and decides to text Scott to see what he is doing. 

No reply.

So Stiles does it again. Then sends one to Allison. Again, no reply. So he sends one to Scott and Allison. No reply. 

For the hell of it Stiles sends one to Scott, Allison, Lydia, and Jackson. Again, no reply.

Pouting Stiles shifts in his seat and decides to just play a game on his cell phone. It's only an hour. It can't be that bad of a wait. After all he has already gone several hours in the jeep already on this kidnapping trip.

It is that bad. They run into a car accident that backs up traffic for miles and adds on another hour to their trip. By the time they get to Portland they are tired, hungry, anxious to get out of the vehicle and Stiles can tell his dad is crossing the line in the sand that would lead to him throttling his only son in order to get him to just _shut up_. 

Unfortunately, before they can get to the hotel or motel or wherever his dad is putting them up for this little kidnapping/working vacation they have to stop by the Portland Police Department in order for his dad to meet up with the detectives in charge of the case since their trip went longer than expected and they work the day shift today.

Stiles wordlessly whines and pouts, since he does _not_ want to be throttled, as they continue on into the city passing by hotel after motel and his body screaming for him to get out of the vehicle and do _something_. 

Finally they arrive at the police department and Stiles jumps out of the vehicle. His dad ignores his antics as Stiles jumps up and down, waving his arms to and fro as he tries to get feeling back into his numb limbs.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning, not much of Grimm will be shown in the beginning. Just so I don't get your hopes up. The reason being due to the shifting time frame of Teen Wolf, seems the show started off at the end of 2010 and is only now reaching March of 2011...so I'm shifting time a bit on Grimm.
> 
> This is part of the reason why the chapter is so late. I had to decide what I was going to do in the coming up chapters because this new information radically changed my perspective on time-frame.
> 
> Due to this, I really hate this chapter. This stupid scene wouldn't end!!! Nothing went how I wanted to and I think it's horrible. 
> 
> Edited: This chapter was vastly longer than the others and has been re-worked several times since I got my beta. My beta and I went through five different fixing sessions on this chapter and probably re-wrote most of it three times.
> 
> That said, please let me know what you think.

It was still day one of what Stiles was calling _The Kidnapping_. Stiles had just finished stretching out the kinks in his back from the long drive from Beacon Hills and followed his father into the Portland PD building. They went through the guest check-in and were escorted up the stairs to the floor that the detectives his dad is supposed to be working with are at. 

The moment that they walked into the room an uneasy feeling swept over Stiles. An Asian police officer in uniform with the same haircut as Stiles is called over by their escort. They exchange a few words and then the officer, Sergeant Wu, Stiles learns, escorts his father over to an office where the Captain is at. Stiles is regulated to the guest chairs. Staring out over the desks and officers as they answer calls. 

It's strange, he is in the middle of a police dept building in the midst of homicide detectives and he isn't feeling safe. He feels on edge and wary and Stiles isn't sure why. It's that little voice in him that tells him something isn't quite right. He doesn't have goosebumps or the hair on the back of his neck rising, but it is a close thing. He feels like he is being watched but not watched with eyes, not any that he can see when he glances around the office, but something else. If he was in Beacon Hills he might say he was being watched by a werewolf or something else that is supernatural in origin. Maybe a ghost? But that doesn't feel right either. 

This strange unknown feeling makes Stiles a bit jumpy and nervous. Even more so than usual. He can't explain it, he doesn't really understand it, all he knows is that something feels off in the room. He didn't feel threatened though. Stiles wondered if he was an animal or a werewolf if this feeling would feel almost as if he stepped into someone or something else's territory. 

Stiles didn't know what to think and every so often he would glance to the door of the office his father was in. He knew his dad was safe, nothing could get in the police dept with all these officers and their guns around, and he knew that the officers had no reason to attack his dad. So why was he so anxious? Why did he feel that he had to keep an eye on his dad? 

His leg was bouncing up and down and his arms kept crossing and uncrossing and his other leg was tapping out some sort of rhythm. The more Stiles tried to calm his body the more it rebelled against him. He wanted to get up and look around. Sort out where the strange warning/wary/invasive territorial feeling was coming from. He wanted to check on his dad. He wanted to get out of this seat. It was driving him nuts. 

He was gaining attention from the officers at their desks and those that were walking around. Stiles wondered if they thought he was on drugs. He was. But it was legal. Prescription and everything. He needed the drugs. It kept him calm...well calmer than how he is off the drugs. 

Unable to contain himself any longer Stiles jumped up and started to pace. At first it was just in front of his seat. Walking left then right then left then right then left then right. Slowly the area in which he was pacing started to get longer. His arms kept going from being crossed across his chest, to in his jean pants pockets, to being clasped behind his back and back again. He knew he was making the cops nervous he caught several of them looking at him sideways and commenting to each other.

It's not his _fault_ he has a _medical condition_! Not everyone is _blessed_ with being able to have control of their body and able to sit still for longer than ten minutes without drugs placating their bodies!

Stiles knew he needed to calm down. He was just taking everything out of context and feeling trapped in the room. Why? He didn't know but he knew that there was nothing actually.

Stiles was hoping it was just because he hadn't taken his medication in a while and the stress of everything he's been through and he would have already taken a pill to help, but he left his pills in his bag in the jeep which is downstairs in the parking lot at his dad's behest. Stiles was sure his dad would have let him take his bag if he knew his son was going to go crazy inside a police station because his medication had worn off – even though Stiles knew there was something else going on that was how he was going to explain to his dad – when his dad comes running out of the room due to the commotion caused by his A.D.H.D. son being tackled down by a horde of cops handcuffing him because they think he is on PHP and is about to do something.

Glancing over to the door where his _dear loving father_ – who left him with nothing to distract himself from boredom – disappeared to, he caught Sergeant Wu's nervous looking eye. As much as he wanted to scream out that everything was fine he was just having a minor panic attack or anxiety attack due to his inability to keep calm while his A.D.H.D. symptoms are acting up he didn't think that it would help matters. At the very least it would embarrass his father and that was a no-no. Especially, not while his dad was still pissed at him about the Isaac Lahey escape issue and it would only increase his dad's disappointment in him. Which is something that Stiles never wants. 

There is also the issue that he thinks the cops won't believe it. They never believe the suspect until all other avenues have been pursued first. So high with bad drugs it is.

Stiles sighs and runs his hand through his hair. He needs to calm down and standing up and pacing isn't making things better. In fact, he thinks it is making things worse. His skin is tingling. God, he feels like he is being spied on by some sort of predator. His body's telling him to run, run far away, far far away.

But he can't. Because like any good, decent, polite, human he's not listening to his gift of fear and is being the naive human getting into a locked box that is controlled by a switch that someone else is standing by even though the guy is giving him serial killer/rapey looks. Elevators are rape traps and death traps but mainly rape traps. 

Stiles takes a deep breath and walks back to his seat. He brings his legs up on the seat and encloses them within his arms wrapped over his shins. He closes his eyes and leans his head down to rest on his knees. He takes a deep long breath through his nose and holds it for ten seconds and then breathes out through his mouth. He does this again and again and again. Trying to slow his heart rate and to calm his body.

It seems to take forever but only minutes have passed since he started and Stiles thinks it's starting to work. He can feel the panic slowly leaving his body. The maniac energy slowly losing its grip on his mind and body. He can feel the light-headedness associated with a high intake of oxygen giving him a natural calming high. Everything's a drug in life. Just depends on how legal and safe they are. Every single cop in this building is an addict to the most powerful and exploited drug in the world, caffeine, typically found in coffee and tea.

However, even with the calmness caused by the breathing exercise Stiles can tell that the feeling of wariness and unease had not left. Stiles was starting to become exasperated and exhausted by the stifling feelings he can't understand. Is it not just in his mind? Is he really picking up some warning? Should he leave? But what about his dad? 

Then all of a sudden Stiles started to notice that the feeling was lifting. One moment it felt like this heavy burden on him would never leave and the next it was suddenly lighter and then after that it was gone completely. Stiles is so shocked by the absence of this unknown wary feeling that for a moment he couldn't believe it was gone. 

Stiles hears a noise by the door from the hallway and in walks two detectives. One was tall and black with broad shoulders and hair as long as Stiles' with a mini mustache and wearing a leather jacket. Stiles wonders for a second what it is that keeps causing him to run into men who wear leather jackets. Does he have a leather fetish? Because this guy – even though, he does look old enough to be a classmate of his father's – looks good in the jacket and then Stiles tries to erase that very thought from his mind because he knows it will lead him to think about Derek and thinking about Derek is all wrong, especially, here and now because then he gets all nervousy and fidgety. He is supposed to be trying to calm down and not fidget because he is in a police station and the cops are still looking at him funny because of his previous pacing incident.

The other detective was lithe, white, with brown hair and eyes. He looks to be about the same height as Stiles except his hair is longer and is combed over to the side. For a second he wonders if the cop was channeling some 70's teen idol heartthrob with that haircut. It looks like it. Then again he could just like having his hair pulled – and Stiles really needs to stop having thoughts like this. Especially, with people old enough to nearly be his father... Maybe he likes older people? Lydia did always seem to be more mature than anyone else he knew. 

The feeling of the absence of the encroaching wary feeling hits him again and Stiles looks around the room wondering where it's coming from and then glances back to the two detectives. _Is it them_?

Stiles is unsure what to do at this point. His curiosity is demanding he go over to their desks and find out if this 'safe zone' is really being emanated by one of them, finding which one it is, or if it is both of them. Yet, he feels restrained due to his dad mandating that he stay in his seat and by the other cops still glancing at him like he might go psycho anytime. Especially, that Sergeant Wu who is still giving him the evil eye...well it could be a wary eye but at this point Stiles feels insulted and thus it is hereby known as an evil eye look. 

Stiles puts up with his curiosity as he watches them from his seat. Once the oppressive atmosphere was lifted his tics and flailing had ceased and his agitation of having to leave the room _now_ ended. However, once he realized that it might be connected to the two detectives he started to get anxious again. This time it wasn't connected to anything supernatural, it was all his own due to his curiosity about what was going on. It was like that time when Scott got bit and Stiles was just so amped up to go into the woods and check out the dead body.

Stiles checks his cell phone, it's on vibrate, as his dad dictated to him to do when they got out of the jeep, but still no messages from Scott and the others. The time shows that he has been waiting for his dad for about forty-five minutes. 

Not bad, per se, but it doesn't leave him much hope for how much longer the meeting will take. 

As Stiles starts up his pacing again he notices that the other cops are glancing at him out of the side of their eyes again. Sergeant Wu just ups and sighs as if it is the worst thing that could possibly happen to him. Stiles thinks that it's a little bit funny. As if the worst thing that could happen to him is Stiles being in his vicinity. He's used to it with his dad's deputies in Beacon Hills, but they all know him. They also know about his _medical condition_ , so they are less likely to take offense and just yell at him to shut up or stop misbehaving.

He notices that Heartthrob detective has glanced at him several times while he paced. Leather Jacket detective did as well and called over Sergeant Wu. Stiles wonders what Sergeant Wu would say. How much does he know anyway? Stiles actually stops in his pacing near a desk in which the officer left so as to surreptitiously listen in on the conversation. 

It fails.

Spectacularly so, as Stiles shows just how klutzy he can be. It seemed that he not only overplayed his hand – they so totally noticed him there in the first place – but that as he was leaning over to tie his shoes, behind the desk so as to hide, he leaned a bit too far and fell over on his back, splayed for them to see. He jumped up quickly so as to save himself the embarrassment and brushed himself off and quietly and quickly sulked off to his chair.

This was just not his day.

Back at his chair Stiles started to tap his shoes on the floor once more. He also kept glancing at his phone. Still nothing. During these times he took to glancing up at the detectives. Not only were they still talking every so often they would glance directly in his direction. 

It was unnerving to say the least. Stiles debated on getting up and walking to the Captain's office if only to glance at his dad and make sure everything was okay or to see if they were finally wrapping things up. His curiosity was driving him insane and the fact that he couldn't find a way to relieve it by distracting himself with something was making it worse. It was like an itch he can't scratch. Why did it stop then? Why those detectives? Why not someone else?

Stiles checked his phone. Still nothing. _What are they doing that they can't even text me a single message? Not even a, Stiles how are you? Or a, how is the kidnapping going?_ Stiles guessed that Scott was wrapped in Allison drama. It was typical that when Stiles needed Scott that Scott was wrapped up in Allison.

Stiles was finding himself lost. With the absence of the attack there was nothing to distract him from the boredom he feels with nothing to do and his medication no longer working. His mind keeps jumping from thought to thought and the over encompassing feeling is boredom.

Trying to focus onto something else, Stiles sends off a text to everyone complaining about his trip, how his dad kidnapped him, how he's been sitting in a police station for nearly an hour with nothing to do and no one to talk to and how he is nearly going stark raving _mad_?!

Stiles wasn't holding out hope that anyone would text him back. Scott was his only real friend and since Allison popped up Stiles has been recasted to _sidekick on standby_. Normally, it wouldn't bother Stiles but he has nothing to occupy his mind and no one else to talk to like Danny or Lydia. Hell, even Isaac would be nice around now...or Derek.

Stiles breathes out deeply and lays his head back against the wall. He wasn't really calm as his fingers starting to tap tap tap on his leg showed. He tried closing his eyes and thinking calming thoughts but that wasn't really going to stop it. He _knew_ that. His agitation was driven by the need to find out just what the _hell_ was going on here. He needed to know why. 

Why did he feel a hostile environment once he walked into the station? Why did it seem to warn him away? Warn him away from what? Or who? Why was it when the two detectives walked in that he felt an ease and sense of safety? Was it them per se that caused this? Or was the feeling of hostility going away on its own and it was just a coincidence? Is it all in his mind? Is Stiles from being around all these supernatural incidents in Beacon Hills making him lose his grip on reality? Is he just imagining everything? Is he going to need more medication to handle his hallucinations?

Stiles didn't know and it was driving him _bonkers_. He knew that this shouldn't bother him. He knew that this could just be nothing. If this had happened a few months back he probably wouldn't even care. He'd probably think that this was all in his head in some way. The fact of the matter is that he is not the Stiles Stilinski of a few months ago. 

No one is. 

People learn things, grow, and change and evolve as persons. Even in the most normal of circumstances. But Stiles has been involved with the supernatural for the past few months of clusterfuck events. He faced down the sociopathic _crazy-as-hell_ Peter Hale and learned that nothing is as it seems from Derek Hale and the times that Scott and him set him up as a patsy for the murders the Alpha committed.

Something just doesn't feel right. It's like his _spidey-senses_ are tingling. Something else is going on and he can't quite put his finger on it. Stiles doesn't know what to think in this situation. He wishes Derek was here or Scott, they should have some idea if he is being paranoid or if there really is some sort of barrier that is causing the hostile aura to surround him and why when those two detectives walked in that he felt the hostility ease.

Stiles sighs again. He lifts his hand to rub over his head as he leans forward from back against the wall. He lets his hand fall back down as he sits hunched over his lap and opens his eyes. Sergeant Wu had wandered off from the desks of the two detectives. Stiles glanced quickly over the room but didn't spot him. He noticed that the two detectives were sitting close and conversing with one another.

Stiles wondered if it was about him. If it was Scott and him they would be talking about the weird kid who everyone in the station is seeming to avoid because he is acting like he is on drugs and unable to sit still for more than five minutes at a time. So, of course, they are talking about him. Still, he wonders what all they are saying. Do they think he is on drugs? Do they think he is anxious about something? Or did they guess right and think it's because he has a _medical condition_ and probably needs to take his medicine?

Stiles glanced back at the door in which his father was shut behind. Still nothing. No change from the last dozen times he checked. Stiles glances at his phone. Nothing there either. Stiles can't figure out if this is one of those 'time flies/watched clock' situations or if it really is taking that long and his friends really are super busy with something. Not that it matters to Stiles stuck as he is in the seat his father demanded he sit in and stay.

 _This is bor–ing_. Stiles sighs. He can't sit down in the seat trying to be good boy his dad wants his son to be. He can't, _things_ are happening and he can't ignore them. It's not like has his pills to calm his mind down from bouncing from one subject to the next and it's not like he has anything to distract him from it either.

 _I'm bor–ed_. Stiles shifts in his seat unable to sit still.

 _Bored_. Stiles' leg starts to bounce.

 _Bored_. Stiles hand starts to tap.

 _BORED!_ Stiles takes a deep sigh and leans back against the wall and lifts his legs onto the seat so that he is once again hugging his legs. He needs to calm down, he needs to focus. He needs to concentrate his whole body on one thing to calm himself down. He tries to focus on breathing, concentrating everything to just one action.

Stiles was unsure how much longer he can take this. He's trying to distract himself from the questions he wants to know but that only make him more anxious. He desperately wants to check on his father. To find out where the warning was coming from. To find out why he felt it. To find out why it left. To find out the connection between it and the two detectives. If there was a connection. Most of all, he wants to find out if there was something supernatural going on or it is all just in his head.

The worst part was that he couldn't. To do that he had to leave his seat and that will just make things worse with his dad.

Stiles sighs and looks up to spy on the detectives once more. Stiles' heart catches in his throat as he realizes they aren't talking secretly anymore. No, they are watching him. Closely. Stiles feels his heart start to beat faster. He can't figure out if it is because they caught him looking at them or if it's his fight/flight/freeze defensive response system kicking in. The detective with the 70's heartthrob hair lifts his hand, points it _straight_ at Stiles and beckons him with a finger.

Stiles futilely turns around to see if there is anyone else nearby that the detective could be pointing at but there is nothing but the wall and empty seats nearby. Stiles slowly unwraps his arms around his legs and puts his feet on the ground. He takes a deep breath and half feeling like he is walking to his own grave site he starts the slow long walk to the desks where the detectives sit. 

As he's walking he glances to the door where his dad is behind. Half willing his dad to come out and save him. Nothing happens though, so Stiles continues his walk off the plank moment. Approaching the desks Heartthrob Hair moves a chair for Stiles to sit in.

Stiles has a funny feeling he is about to be interrogated. Harshly.

Sitting down between the two detectives makes Stiles even more nervous and he starts to tap his fingers on the desk while he waits for one of them to speak.

It's Leather Jacket detective who speaks first with a deep voice while Heartthrob Hair watches him. "So, Wu tells us that you're here with your dad. A cop working on a case that intersects with one of our department's own?"

Stiffly and with a slight insolence Stiles replies. "Sheriff. My dad is the Sheriff of Beacon Hills and yeah from what I know of it dad says that one of Portland PD's case and his own looks alike so he wanted to come up to exchange information on it."

"Hmm," Leather Jacket responds.

Stiles replicated the non-verbal sound in a sarcastic manner his nerves starting to get to him. To his astonishment he wasn't reprimanded for being a smart-ass They laughed instead. Not a fully body laugh or anything of the sort but the low chuckle that showed amusement.

"Hank Griffin," Leather Jacket tells Stiles as his holds out his hand.

Stiles shakes Hank's hand a little bemused at what is going on. He thought this was going to be an interrogation or something but it seems like they are just introducing themselves to Stiles?

"Nick Burkhardt," Heartthrob Hair tells Stiles as he holds out his hand. As Stiles' hand connects with Nick's a feeling of peace and calm zings through his body. It is then that Stiles realizes that Nick is the one that is emanating the peaceful aura that is wrapped around this room. The hostile feeling that was being effused throughout the room was being repelled by the tranquility that Nick was radiating from his being. 

Stiles didn't understand it. He half thought that it was all in his head but now he knows it wasn't. Now he knows not only that the feeling of peace was coming from someone and he _felt_ it, but that the feeling of hostility and warning was also being broadcast throughout the room by someone or something. 

Stiles takes a calming breath and tells them his name. He twists his hands in his lap, after he shakes Nick's hand, as he tries to calm down – which should be easy considering that Nick is radiating calm throughout the room but it's really not since Stiles' mind is going in overdrive trying to understand what in the hell is going on in Portland – and breathes slowly as he takes this all in. He has to be calm. He has to act like nothing supernatural is going on. He's not even sure that Nick knows that he's doing this. 

Stiles isn't even sure if anyone but him has noticed what's going on. Nobody has changed in their attitude or demeanor since Nick and Hank walked in. No one has had a radical shift in mood. The only one who has acted strange this whole time has been Stiles. Stiles alone.

"Stiles Stilinski? What kind of name is that?" Stiles hears Hank ask through Stiles' rambling assessment of the panic/calm down state of the supernatural psychic territorial dispute situation.

"My own name. I chose it." Stiles glares at Hank for daring to insult the name that he chose to name himself. It was an awesome name. Everybody loved it.

"Chose it?" Hank asks confused.

"My mother named me after my grandfather and it's one of those old country unpronounceable names. I couldn't pronounce it or my last name when I was younger so I just went by Stiles and kept it that way." Stiles spoke in the _got a problem with it_ tone of the easily offended. 

Hank threw Nick a _save me_ look and Nick decided to comply. "So, you said you are from Beacon Hills. Hank, why does that name sound familiar?"

Stiles knew all he had to do was say one word, well two if you want to get technical, and they would know. Everyone knew who Kate Argent was. Not only did she hire some goons to massacre an entire family, the Hales, but she also, six years later, murdered each and every co-conspirator involved in the original murder and cover-up. The fact that she was found dead with her throat ripped out, well her windpipe if you want to be pedantic about it, just added fuel to the gossip fodder.

Hank knew he recognized the name but he just couldn't place it. "Beacon Hills. Beacon Hills. Beacon Hills. I'm not sure. I know I should know it. Is it from one of our cases?" 

"No I don't think so," Nick replied somewhat unsure himself.

Hank thought some more about it. "So something else then. Maybe something news worthy happened there?"

"Where is Beacon Hills?" Nick asked Stiles. 

With a tiny smirk Stiles replied, "California"

With this new information Hank thought he might be able to place the town. "Beacon Hills, California. Beacon Hills California. Beacon Hills California."

Stiles is trying not to smirk but it is hard to do. His little big-town home to werewolves and the supernatural in the middle of the woods is hard to forget for those who live there. But to a big city like Portland it must be boondockville for all that they care about it until something big like a Kate Argent happens and makes state and national news.

Hank noticed that Stiles was smirking and pointed it out. "He's smirking Nick."

Nick takes this all in stride with a little sarcastic humor. "He is, isn't he? So he must know why we recognize the name, but can't place it."

Hank nods and says contemplatively, "So something big must've happened there."

"Now what could make a small no-name town gain national coverage, Hank?" Nick says with a little dry humor.

Hank continues on in this vein, "Had to be gossip worthy. So probably either a big drugs bust, some big scandal, or serial killer murders."

Hank and Nick noticed that Stiles twitched on two phrases during Hank's spiel. Nick brought it up since it was his turn to speak. "He twitched on big scandal and serial killer, Hank. Now, what do you think that means?"

Hank pretended to take a long time, just a few seconds, to think on this new _revelation_. "Probably a combination of them both."

Stiles knew what was going on and decided to play along. "Aren't you guys just going to google it for the information instead of doing this twenty questions thing?"

Hank chuckled. "Now where would the fun be in that. So Nick, we have a combination of a scandal and a serial killer case in California that caused national news and we paid attention to it."

Nick nods thinking. "That does narrow it down."

Hank goes back to reciting the town's name hoping to jog his memory. "Beacon Hills. Beacon Hills. Beacon Hills. It's just on the tip of my tongue."

"Serial killer, Beacon Hills, scandal, national press..." Nick looks at Stiles, "female killer?" Stiles twitched. _Damnit_.

Hank crows in joy, "Oooh, smart one Nick. So Beacon Hills, female serial killer, big scandal, and national press."

A loud barking voice erupts in the room. "STILES!"

Stiles jumps and falls off of the chair. Trying to pick it up again he overcompensates and falls again. Finally he gives up and just stands up brushing off his clothes and quickly walks over to his dad. "Hey dad. Now, whatever you might want to say let me first say that it wasn't my fault whatever you think that I did."

"Stiles," his dad sighs his name, "why aren't you in your seat?"

"They made me!" Stiles points accusingly towards Hank and Nick. "I was minding my own business in the seat as you told me to. I was just sitting down, bored out of my mind I mean really dad you leave me alone in a room to sit in a seat with nothing to occupy myself and no medicine and you think I'm not going to go stark raving mad I mean really dad –" 

Stiles can see his dad losing his patience as his explanation gets longer. "Stiles."

"So I was just sitting there minding my own business and they called me over. You always told me to obey officers especially when they are telling me to do something. So I did. So if I disobeyed an order you gave me you only have yourself to blame as you told me the previous order – that of obeying cops' orders – years ago and so I figured that if I had to disobey one order over the other that the older one was probably the right one to follow and the new one was probably the one to–"

With frustration lacing every syllable his dad says, "Stiles." 

Stiles knows that sound and says softly, "Shut up?"

"Yes," his father sighs out.

Stiles, however, needs to know if he is trouble and can't help but to ask, "Am I in trouble?"

"Stiles," his father grounds out.

Stiles can't let it go. "But it's a reasonable question. I mean I only did as you told me to. So I shouldn't really be in trouble–"

The entire time this conversation between father and son takes place the room had gone quiet as they witnessed what could only be described as a train-wreck. Stiles was full on flailing about like a fish out of water. It was the one thing to see him pacing back and forth like someone on cocaine, but this was something completely different. The hand waving and verbal vomit was like icing on the crazy cake.

Nick and Hank were taking it in stride as Nick had explained to Hank – that from what he observed from watching the kid sitting down and trying to act still and what Sergeant Wu had told them about the pacing – that the kid had some form of hyperactivity disorder and was unable to sit still. Hank didn't really believe it since the kid just seemed to be nervous. But seeing him now in his full spastic glory as he put the blame on them for him disobeying his father blew any doubts out of his mind. 

Stiles' dad finally had enough and grabbed Stiles' shoulders and shook him just once while saying in a quiet commanding tone, "Stiles, enough." Stiles went quiet. He had a flashback to Derek speaking to him in that tone. For some strange reason it always worked when he was in one of his verbal vomit episodes.

Stiles noticed that someone was walking up behind his father. From the way that everyone was acting towards the tall man he would assume that it must be someone of higher rank. Stiles assumes he was attracted by the commotion going on in the room. He stops right behind his dad and his dad turned to the man and then back to Stiles. "Stiles, this is Captain Sean Renard he was explaining to me their case and whom I will be working with during my stay here. Captain Renard this is my son, Stiles."

Captain Renard held out his hand and Stiles shook it as the polite son of the Sheriff is supposed to do. It was at the very moment that his hand touched Renard's that he felt the deep-seated feeling of hostile warning, only it was more concentrated and stronger, that Stiles realized that this is where the supernatural psychic territorial warning was coming from that encapsulated the room. Instantly Stiles' eyes swerved to Nick who was sitting calmly at his desk talking to Hank. 

Stiles eyes went back to Renard's and met his and he saw something funny. Not funny as in laughable, but funny as in odd, as in he wasn't sure what he saw. For just a moment Renard's eyes glinted and Stiles could have sworn they shined but nothing like what he was used to dealing with the werewolves. So, he wasn't sure he really saw anything at all. Except he noticed that Renard's eyes had met his directly after he looked at Nick and Stiles saw Renard look at Nick and then back to him. A strange grin or smirk seemed to start to come into being on Renard's face, but Stiles' dad interrupted their staring contest asking if Stiles was all right.

Stiles heard his name spoken by his dad in a careful concerned tone, "Stiles?"

It seems that Stiles and Renard had been shaking hands for longer than he thought and his dad found it odd for Stiles to stare up into someone's eyes, who wasn't Lydia, like he was starstruck.

Stiles didn't know what to do and he just said the first thing that popped into his head, "Pretty eyes."

Silence encased the room of those who heard that comment. Stiles went bright red and started to sputter out an excuse for his most recent and embarrassing verbal vomit episode. Stiles just knows that this is going to be a downward spiral of unmitigated embarrassment for everyone involved but he just can't shut up it's his default status when faced with horribly embarrassing moments, to just make them worse. "Uh, not that that I, I mean I'm not uh hitting on you or anything just that you have pretty eyes–"

Thank god for everyone involved that his dad woke up to his senses and slammed his palm against his son's mouth to stop the verbal explosion of embarrassment. Stiles, from his vantage point of being directly in front of him, could see that Renard found amusement in this incident. He wasn't smirking and his lips weren't twitching but his eyes glinted just like Derek's does when he finds something amusing, but because he has some sort of inability to visually show such due in part because he thinks he's some sort of tall dark and stoic melancholic long-suffering hero of a supernatural TV show. Angel maybe. But does that make Stiles Buffy? Or Cordelia?

Wait...what the hell is he thinking about? Angel? Buffy? Cordelia? He's not attracted to Derek...he's not. He likes Lydia. So there is no way that he is either Buffy or Cordelia... Nope, no way. 

Stiles' dad interrupts his ramblings in his head. "We should be going now. We need to check in to our hotel and I think Stiles–" His dad shakes him a little bit while tightening his hold over Stiles' mouth. "–needs something to eat and take his medicine so he can probably think before speaking again." The last part was a dig to Stiles he just knows it was since his dad's voice went a bit deeper and his hand over Stiles' mouth increased in pressure just a little bit. "It was nice to meet you Captain Renard I look forward to working with your detectives on the case." It is at this point that Stiles' dad finally removes his hand and then starts to push Stiles out of the room. "Let's go Stiles."

Stiles pushes back against his dad a bit so he can wave bye to Nick and Hank and then lets his dad finish pushing him out of the room so he can be dragged off through the hallway and out of the building. Stiles just can't believe what this trip is turning into. His dad specifically had them leave Beacon Hills so that they could escape the supernatural – not that his dad knows that it's supernatural things killing everybody – so they could have some nice time in a new town to enjoy some peace. 

Looking back in the direction of the detectives' room – as Stiles is dragged by his dad down the hallway on the way out of the station – Stiles has this feeling that things aren't going to go the way that they planned. A deep-seated feeling that causes his heart to quicken and his breath to catch and for Stiles to wish that Scott and/or Derek was there with him because he has a feeling he is going to need them.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got me a BETA! Yay! So the updates might be a bit slower because both of us are going back to school. Me for my fourth degree, Masters in Business. It's all online and I work from home anyways for my little press. So the writing won't slow down per se, but the updates might. 
> 
> Instead of posting them as soon as I'm done editing them I will wait to see what my beta thinks. 
> 
> I have a plan on this story. Because of the convoluted epic-ness of the story I have planned I'm turning it into a series. It is called, thus far, _Werewolves and Hunters and Wesen and Grimms, Oh My!_ As a play on Wizard of Oz's _Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!_
> 
> Thus far it is planned to be 3 parts. I might make it more than that. This is the first part, A Grimm Visit, since it introduces Stiles to Grimms. Second part takes place back in Beacon Hills. Third Part will be back in Portland. 
> 
> The first part, will be the shortest because it is taking place in the week between the end of Teen Wolf season 2 ep 2 and ep 4. I have it at more or less 15 chapters. I'm writing this as I go along so that might change.
> 
> The reason why this chapter has taken so long has been due to the editing myself and my beta did to chapter 4. Because of the close ties of the chapters I held off on posting chapter 5 until chapter 4 was fixed. 
> 
> As always, reviews are greatly appreciated.

Day two of _The Kidnapping_ started off much different than day one. For instance, Stiles was allowed to sleep in.

Yesterday afternoon Stilinski father and son dragged their asses to the hotel – not a rich one but no Motel 6 either, there's no room service, however, there is a continental breakfast – unloaded their stuff in the room and then went out to find some place to eat. Like always Stiles and his dad argued over what kind of food to eat. 

Like always Stiles turned on the puppydog eyes and his father caved and ate healthy food. Stiles thinks that he should count his puppydog eyes along with his sarcasm as one of his weapons. No one can resist them. 

His dad may bitch and grumble but he knows that Stiles does this for him and because he loves him. Stiles thinks it makes his dad all giddy inside...many hours later when he can safely reflect on how much his son loves him to force him to eat food he hates but is good for him. Stiles likes to think that his dad knows all the other dads in the world are jealous of the way that Stiles loves his dad and watches out for his dad. He just hopes it makes up for all the embarrassment that Stiles gives him when he acts up. 

The meal was tasty and healthy and even his dad had to concede that it didn't taste _that_ bad. So Stiles took it as a win for him and another loss to his dad in their everlasting battle over healthy food.

After their early dinner they came back to the hotel and watched some TV. Well watched would imply that that is all they did. What really happened is that his dad started to work on the case files again and Stiles was on his laptop working on his homework assignments and checking his phone to see if anyone text'd him back.

It was like Stiles had thought; Scott had Allison troubles. Probably still trying to work around the _'werewolf hunter parent death threat'_ – Stiles wonders if that should be trademarked – if they are ever caught dating again. Stiles has a feeling that if he was in Beacon Hills he would be forwarding messages between the two of them to help in their quest of finding happiness in their epic star-crossed romance. In fact, that was one of the messages. For Stiles to forward messages to Allison from Scott when he gets back to town. Scott even had the nerve to ask for Stiles to forward his text messages to Allison.

Stiles, fed up with things, went to bed.

Stiles was currently still unhappy about that proposition plus the fact that he was ignored by _everyone_ all freaking day, yesterday. At the moment he was ignoring his phone and any and all text messages that Scott wanted to send him. Let's see how he likes that. 

Jackson and Lydia ignored his messages. Didn't even have excuses for not replying. Nothing. Not that Stiles thought that anything would change but it still sucked.

Stiles wonder if he had Isaac's number if Isaac would have text'd back. 

And then Stiles just _stopped_. 

The silence of the room was engulfing and Stiles knew he couldn't just distract himself any longer from what his mind wanted to think/freak out over. The thing that happened yesterday in the police station building. 

When they first left the station Stiles was still in shock and just wanted to distract himself from even thinking about what exactly happened. 

His mind was half-rambling half-stuck on processing the new information that it gathered. The moment he stepped foot into that room full of detectives he wanted to grab his father and run as far and as fast as he could out of that place. He never wanted to be there. His flight response was in overdrive. Everything that enabled him to survive the past few months was _screaming_ at him to get out of that room.

But he couldn't. He had to follow proper decorum and had to stay. His dad was going to stay no matter what. So Stiles had to stay as well. He half-thought he had a mental breakdown from all the stress that has been accumulating. The idea that it wasn't all in his head...he didn't know which was the worst outcome; him losing his mind, or actually being able to feel a supernatural psychic attack telling him to get the hell out of the room. 

His mind kept trying to process what was going on and the rambling in his head as his A.D.H.D. picked up was insane. He couldn't sit still because he wanted to run. He couldn't stop thinking about the warning and the feeling and his father and the threat because it was constantly pressing upon him. He couldn't accept it was happening because he couldn't understand what _was_ happening. It was like he was thrown into the deep end of the pool and sinking to the bottom and he was unable to move because he didn't understand what swimming was.

It wasn't until the moment he touched Nick's hand that he had his answer and it was _terrifying_. Even now, nearly a full day from then he still couldn't shake it. He still felt off, felt like he should run from all the crazy. He half-wanted to call up Renard and ask him what the fuck was going on. How he caused that feeling, why Nick caused it to retreat, why Stiles felt it? But he couldn't, he was scared and he didn't know if Renard would be a friend or a foe. _I guess this is how Scott feels about being a werewolf and Derek when they first met._

When the supernatural is real and you can see it and feel it what do you do when it turns against you and you have no idea what to do to protect yourself or where to go?

For Stiles, when he saw everything happening to Scott the first thing he did was go into research overload mode. It would be different here. He didn't know where the public library was and he wasn't sure if they would have the books he would need and it's not like he can order them and have them shipped to the hotel room since they would only be here for a few more days.

Stiles wondered if Doc Deaton might know but he was still an unknown as well. Not to mention, he might know about werewolves and alphas, but did he know about psychic attacks caused by some supernatural being? What if they weren't supernatural? What if it was just a psychic projection? If werewolves exist who is to say that witches or psychics or something else doesn't exist as well?

Stiles noticed that he was working himself into a panic attack over all of the what ifs. His hands were shaking and his breaths were coming in raggedly and shorter and Stiles decided enough was _enough_. Stiles took a deep breath, in through his nose and out through his mouth. He did it repeatedly until he calmed himself down. 

He was Stiles Stilinski best friend to Scott McCall and he faced down Peter Hale in his most psychopathic state. He was not going to freak out over a little supernatural attack. He was going to do what he does best; research the problem, find the answer, and implement it.

If he was under a psychic attack he is going to find out why, how, who, and stop it. Stiles is not some weak little kid. He does not get scared of the dark. The night Scott got bit was because they were adventurous enough to go into the woods in the middle of the night over the report of a dead body. He is not going to let what has happened to him change him for the worse. He learned there are monsters in the dead of the night and he also learned how to fight back and win.

First things things first, make a list of what needs answered and find the answers.

> _  
> What was that psychic attack?_

> _Is it something specific to ward off supernatural creatures?_

> _Am I a supernatural creature?_

> _Or is it just because he's more sensitive to the supernatural because of all the werewolf mess going on in Beacon Hills?_

> _If Renard was exuding a 'no trespassers/keep out' sign against the supernatural in the detectives room then why was Nick negating it?_

> _Is Renard protecting Nick or vice versa?_

> _Maybe Nick is Renard's focal point? But Renard didn't look Supernatural...yet he was the one who caused the attack and he knew it and he knew that I knew it as well._

> _Am I in danger? Is my dad?_

> _Is it just Renard and Nick or are there others?_

> _What can I do to protect myself?  
> _

With the list in hand Stiles starts his search for answers to his questions online. He will start where he got his answers for Scott's bite and move on from there. Nothing happens without a cause and an answer will be somewhere. Either online or in ancient books. 

By the time it was noon Stiles has poured over site after site after site. The answers in his spreadsheet and notebooks were confusing, conflicting, and contradicting. It was impossible to tell which was the right answer or even if they would work. 

Stiles needed a break. He was hungry and he needed fuel. Since the hotel didn't have room service he would have to go search for food himself. He text'd his dad that he would be going out for substance and went down to the hotel lobby to ask for directions to a nice sandwich shop nearby.

It was a nice quiet walk the couple of blocks it would take to get to the cafe. Stiles thought about texting Scott to see what he was doing but he was still too mad at him to really want to talk to him. Stiles did not like getting blown off for Allison and their melodramatic great romance. Especially, not when he needed to talk to Scott or needed his help. 

So, no distracting himself with talking to Scott to see what is going on in Beacon Hills. 

The cafe, _Dingo Baby_ , was typical of hippie-ish Portland, it fit with Stiles' eating style of healthy food and was decorated like it was done by 'pop-art meets impressionists' college art students. It was interesting and funky and calming at the same time. Stiles thought he could love this place. It didn't hurt that the food was good and there was wi-fi service. Which would be awesome for Stiles to make this place his new hang out but he left his laptop back in the room. 

He sat there long after he had ate his food and drank his drink and wondered what he was going to do next. Back in the hotel room he tried searching for information at the usual sites he went to for information on Werewolves, but this psychic stuff was something else. 

There was so much information out there from esp to witchcraft to ghosts to electric magnetic waves, there was no real way to say which applied to Stiles' situation. He knew it was caused by someone or some creature – but again Renard looked very human to Stiles and didn't seem to be any creature he could recognize – and they had control of it. Renard knew he felt it when he shook hands with him. He also knew that it also had something to do with Nick. 

Stiles just wasn't able to put his finger on where exactly the two points meet. Why did it have something to do with Nick? Was Renard being territorial and protective of Nick? Why? 

Renard is a cop, he is a Captain of a police precinct and while there are such things as bad and corrupt cops, Renard seems to be one of the good guys. He didn't give Stiles any iffy feelings from the short time that he was in his presence, unless you count the big _back off_ psychic attack he was sending. Stiles, however, thought it wasn't directed towards any one person but to anyone who could pick it up.

The look Renard gave him was strange. It wasn't one of the _don't say anything and you won't get hurt_ looks either. It was more amused and predatorial. Not as in _I'm going to kill you and eat you up_ ones either. It was more _I found something interesting and I wonder how I can use it to my advantage_. Stiles wasn't sure if it was a good thing or not to be found useful. 

He knew practically nothing about Renard. He couldn't really find anything online just typical information. Of course, Stiles isn't a hacker so he's judging everything by what he's finding online through the local newspapers and public records so it might not be everything that can be found, but still it's usually a good indicator of what a person is like.

Renard, however, has less than what you would typically find for someone who lives in the Twenty-First Century. There was no Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, etcetera social networks attached to him. Not from the information he could find. There was nothing about his past either. It's like he just showed up one day as a cop and worked his way through the system without leaving any dirt, shady arrests, or anything but a squeaky clean record. No lawsuits either.

It was weird.

Every cop has at least one bad thing on their record. Mostly from their rookie years and learning how to do their job or if they arrest someone big and powerful and they make a stink to cause payback. Even Stiles' dad has a few.

But Captain Sean Renard is as clean as they come that Stiles can see without getting a hold of internal affairs' records.

Nick and Hank's records are typical of what Stiles would find of good cops. Instances of pissing off the wrong people but nothing about excessive violence or abuse of power. 

Nothing seems to be out of the ordinary on any of them. The only odd thing is that Nick's parents seemed to be have been killed in a car accident and he was raised by his aunt. Whom it seems was recently attacked? Several times? Yet, died of complications attributed to cancer. 

Maybe there is something weird there about the aunt, but Stiles isn't sure it has anything to do with what is going on with him. 

Seems to be another dead end. 

Going over his notes again Stiles just can't see what to do next. There is an overflow of information on psychics but nothing that really pertains to his specific situation. There is nothing he can find in the pasts of the people who were involved in the situation either. Without putting himself through it again, Stiles isn't sure there is anything to do. There is a lack of data to extrapolate anything that can narrow down what exactly happened and why.

Stiles doesn't exactly feel like he was threatened by Renard but he doesn't feel safe either with the knowledge that he knows exactly what happened, why, how, and that Stiles could sense it. The look he gave him, what did it mean? Does he plan on contacting Stiles with information about what happened? Is planning on watching or having Stiles watched to see if Stiles knows what happened and what he will do next?

It's getting late in the afternoon and staring into space thinking about the situation he found himself in is only making Stiles more melancholic and uncertain. So, bored, Stiles decides to text Scott to see if he can take his mind off things. He's still upset, but at this moment Scott's melodramatic epic romance is what he needs to distract himself. 

Unfortunately, it seems Scott is busy with said epic romance and so cannot be bothered to respond to Stiles' messages. For half a second Stiles wonders if he should text the others, but since they still haven't responded to his texts from yesterday Stiles decides to continue to ignore them.

With nothing else to do Stiles decides to pack it in and go back to the hotel to finish his research. Maybe he will find more information if he digs further into the aunt. She might not be directly connected to things, but it just seems so odd for some little librarian to have assassins come after her when she is already dying. On top of that is the fact that she is Nick's aunt and Nick has that tranquility psychic emission thing going on. So maybe it's related to what's happening. 

It's a big maybe, but it's the only lead that Stiles has at the moment.

Decided, Stiles orders some dinner for him and his dad to go and begins his trek back to the hotel. The wind is chilly, but not too bad for Portland in mid-winter. 

Everything is going fine until Stiles trips over his own feet and plows into someone and then things go pear-shaped. At first Stiles starts to apologize and then reaches to help the person up but then he notices something. The guys' face _shifts_. It's like nothing Stiles has seen in real life before but only in movies and TV shows. 

One minute he's looking at a normal middle-age man with dark hair and a pale face and gray eyes and the next his neck moves in this odd shaking motion and this like clear film is removed from the face and he's suddenly facing something not human. There is fur where there was skin. The eyes stay the same but they become more sunken in the face. Two beaver-like top teeth pop down as well. Stiles doesn't know why but he is sure that this person suddenly looks more mouse-like than a beaver or anything.

Stiles' hand is frozen in its position where he held it out for the man to grab onto. He's in a state of shock. His eyes blink and the sight stays the same. He wants to pinch himself, back away, scream, ask if anyone else can see what he is seeing, but all he can do is stand there with this bemused and stupefied look upon his face. He is for once in his life completely shocked into stillness.

Suddenly a verse of Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody pops into his head, _'Is this real life, or is this just fantasy',_ and Stiles can't find the answer in him.

The man sees his reaction, looks up slowly, and a look of pure terror overcomes him. He starts to stutter out something. Stiles can't tell what it is but he thinks it starts with a 'g'. He takes big gulps of air like he can't breathe, starts to scoot himself backwards, and hurriedly picks himself up and runs off in the other direction he was headed.

Stiles is unsure what just happened. He looks around him to see if anyone noticed anything, but it seems as if nothing really unusual took place. Sure a middle-age man just ran off screaming in terror after getting a look at a teenage boy and that is unusual, but nothing that gives away that they saw a man turn into a were-thing. Nothing that would give away the idea that they just watched a human shift into a half-animal with fur and teeth. Nothing that anything supernatural took place.

Which is just mind-boggling. Stiles knows what he just saw. He saw some were-animal shift. With werewolves when they shift it's a completely physical shift and _everyone_ around the area can see it. It freaks people out. Some people run away screaming. Others get weapons to attack the werewolf. 

But this? Pretending that it's an everyday thing? That nothing actually happened? Stiles has _never_ seen that. Not even around his friends. Not even him, he always reacts, tiny and a little heart-racing, but he reacts to the change.

No one did here. _No one_.

How can a were shift and no one else notice? 

Why the hell did the were run off screaming in terror when he noticed Stiles? Is it because of Stiles' reaction to his shift? Or is there something else going on? Is this connected to _the situation_?

Running his hand through his hair and looking around the street, Stiles has a feeling that something more is going on here and he's going to find the answer to it. Whether he wants to or not.

Freaking out can take place later what matters now is research. So Stiles stiffly walks back to the hotel, every once in a while take a glance around him to see if he sees any more weres. 

He doesn't. 

Stiles doesn't know if this is a good or a bad thing.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Saw the finale of Teen Wolf and the season 2 premiere of Grimm. Everything fits within my canon-line of events.
> 
> Since I know what is coming next for AGV, all I need to do is write it down. Which isn't difficult at all and I'm getting them to my beta pretty fast. The turn-a-round though is a bit longer since there are at least two revisions before both of us are satisfied. 
> 
> As always, criticism and comments are greatly appreciated.
> 
> I'm working on a fic for the Teen Wolf fanfic contest that MTV is hosting.

Day three of _The Kidnapping_ started off about the same as day two with Stiles sleeping in. 

When he got back to the hotel after the incident with the were-mouse, Stiles went to his laptop and spent hours researching. He heard his cell phone go off with new text messages but whatever issues Scott was having would have to take second place to Stiles'.

The first sites Stiles went through were the ones that he used earlier in the day when he was researching the psychic attacks. This time Stiles thought he would see a better yield because they were in the same genus of were-animal shifters. At least, Stiles thought so.

Turns out that Stiles was wrong. A were-mouse that most people can't see? Nope, no information online. At least not by the description that Stiles was looking for. Especially the part about how the head shook back and forth quickly a couple of times and then a film-like veil was removed over the face and Stiles saw the mouse-like features. 

None of that could be used to identify what sort of creature he saw or even why only he saw it. 

Stiles' dad arrived back at the hotel not too long after Stiles got back, they ate the food Stiles brought back, his dad didn't complain about it. He actually liked it. Stiles smiled and said he would get some more the next day. 

Besides the creepy incident with the were-mouse it seemed that yesterday was a good day. His dad was making progress in his case. Stiles' homework for the week was done. Nothing horrible happened in Beacon Hills except for Scott somehow knowing when Erica was going to have a seizure on the rock-wall after gym class had ended. 

Stiles had wondered if Scott knowing about the seizure had something to do with his super-hearing. But Scott had text'd him back saying that he didn't hear it, his hand had shook a bit and he just _knew_ what had happened. Stiles had tried to get Scott to explain more about but he didn't understand it so he couldn't explain it.

Stiles wondered if it was similar to what he felt about the psychic attack. He could feel it happening to him but it was beyond him to be able to describe it more than just an intense feeling of warning to get him out of the room. 

Maybe werewolves had not just super-hearing but also the senses of an animal? Sort of like what happens when various animals start acting weird and birds take off flying in droves away from an area seconds to even weeks before an earthquake happens. Some [scientists](http://earthquake.usgs.gov/learn/topics/animal_eqs.php) theorize that it has to do with animals able to feel/hear the [p-waves](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-wave) before the [s-waves](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-wave) while most humans are unable to. There is also the [theory](http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/15945014) that animals who live near groundwater are able to taste the chemical difference in the water caused by the ground shifting underneath or positive ions released into the air causing stress hormones. 

Stiles wonders if Scott's hand shaking had to do with him feeling the effects of the epileptic seizure since they are associated with [abnormal](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epilepsy) electric activity in the brain. Some [scientists](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthquake_prediction#Animal_behavior) think that sensing earthquakes can be tied to animals' ability to sense changes in electromagnetic waves. 

It would be intriguing to test but Stiles isn't sure any of the guys would be willing to submit themselves to the various methods that Stiles would use to try out the theory. If it did work, and he could prove that animals (and werewolves) could sense earthquakes before they hit, he might be able to win a big scientific prize, maybe even a Nobel. He should try to get Lydia to help him with this, with her brains and his inventiveness they might rewrite current scientific theories on earthquakes and earthquake prediction. 

Then again, that would require him telling Lydia (and everyone else) about the existence of werewolves because that would be where they would gather their data and that's just a big no-no. In the real world, _True Blood_ happy endings just don't take place. Argents would be popping up all over the place not to the mention the Tea Party, KKK, NOM, and various other hate organizations. Questions about humanity, religion, physiology, biology, evolution and etcetera would be popping up all over the place. Not to mention the terrorists...

Nope, no sharing the information. 

But it would be compelling to find out the limits of the werewolves ability to see, hear, taste, and sense and how it differs from humans. Stiles wondered if maybe they are able to see infrared lights or gamma rays...

What would it be like to see the universe through a werewolves eyes? Is it like the difference between analog and high definition, mono sound and stereo? 

Would werewolves be able to see things that humans cannot? Like energy or ghosts or maybe what Stiles has been seeing with the weird were-mouse? Would werewolves have been able to sense the psychic attack? Like how Stiles sensed it? Or as another way?

Another thing is why would Stiles be able to see the were-mouse? If Stiles is human and has no supernatural abilities then why was he able to see what the other humans around him couldn't? Is the supernatural contagious? Stiles being around werewolves allowed him to pick up ways to see things other humans can't? Then why did the were-mouse panic like that? Was it because he knew that Stiles could see him and he shouldn't be able to? Or was something else going on?

Stiles didn't know who to turn to for answers. Should he contact Derek? Ask him about the were-mouse? But Derek was persona non grata since Peter and Isaac. Scott wouldn't like it. 

Lying down on his bed watching TV while contemplating his life with the supernatural wasn't doing him any good to figure out his problem with the situation and Renard.

That was the crux of the issue. Not just the fact that he was suddenly seeing were-people that other people couldn't but the fact that someone knew something was off about him. Knew that he knew that they were doing something supernatural and that it had to do with Detective Nick Burkhardt.

What was it that made Renard send the psychic attack out and why did he think it had to do with Nick himself? 

Stiles looked at the clock and realized it was close to lunch time so he packed up his things and grabbed his wallet and went back to _Dingo Baby_ to grab some food and surf the internet.

The entire time that Stiles was walking there he was looking around to see if he could spot anymore of the glamouring were-mice or other were-animals, but he didn't spot any. Stiles was unsure if this meant anything good or bad, did he imagine it or are there none around him? 

The entire time that he was at _Dingo Baby_ he was thinking about _the situation_ and Nick and Renard. Renard knew what was going on but it looked like Nick didn't. Nick also had an aunt who raised him who suddenly had assassins after her blood shortly before she died. Maybe the clues to what was going on lay with the aunt? Marie Kessler. 

So Stiles started to dig up what he could about Marie Kessler, but there is only so much you can get online. Stiles searched for public libraries and found one close by. He needed to find more information about Nick and Renard anyway so going to the library was bound to happen. Librarians know ways of finding information. 

Getting another take-away meal for him and his dad Stiles left _Dingo Baby_ to go back to the hotel to drop off his food in the little icebox in the room before he headed for the library. 

He was nearly back at the hotel when he noticed something out of the corner of his eye. He turned his head and there was someone across the street staring at him. He just standing there and then suddenly his face _shifted_ , but underneath wasn't a face that was like the were-mouse's instead there was something that looked sort of reptilian. It was hard to tell exactly what it looked like from where Stiles was standing, but he knew this was something he'd never seen before and he knew that this guy wanted him to see it.

A chill raced down Stiles' back as he caught the other man's eyes. A bus passed down the street and obscured his sight of the other man and when the bus pass through the man was gone. _Not good. Not good at all._

Stiles didn't know if this was just another were-creature he happened to pass in the street and instead of the cowardly were-mouse this man was more confrontational, or if this was someone sent by Renard. To keep an eye on him? To protect him? To intimidate him? 

Stiles didn't know, but he needed to find out. 

If he just called Renard up he might tell him the truth. But he might also lie to him. He might deny anything of the sort happened when they first met and do something in his power to intimidate Stiles. 

From the brief meeting he had with Renard, he came across as someone that was a cross between Alpha!Derek and a more sane Peter Hale. Stiles didn't know which side Renard is on and whether or not Stiles was a chess piece to move or someone in his way. 

Stiles did not like this. It felt like he was being watched. Did they know who he was or did they just sense him? Did they know he could see them?

Maybe he should call Derek. The guy could be a bit of a dick but he also came through to help them when they needed it. When _Stiles_ needed it.

Scott, though, wouldn't like it. 

Maybe tomorrow if he didn't find anything knew or if things got worse. For now, he would just go back to the hotel, drop off his food, and head to the library. 

The whole time he was walking to the hotel he kept glancing around trying to see if he noticed anyone following him. He did the same when he walked to the library. Nothing, no one that seemed out of the ordinary. No one that set his spidey-senses off.

It figured that when it happened it would be in the library after he got some tips from the librarian on where to conduct his search for mythologies, theologies, fantasy, and the supernatural/paranormal books and articles. 

He was reaching up his hand to grab a book when he noticed someone, a woman only a few years older than him, to his side skimming through a book in her hands. He was about to ask her what book she was reading – since it might be from the same section he needed to search – when suddenly her face _shifted_. Her new face was similar to the were-mouse but had subtle differences as well. She caught his eye and her face went pale, bloodless in a way, and she started to back away. 

She had dropped the book and as Stiles reached for it to hand it back to her she uttered out a phrase and then took off like the hounds of hell were at her feet. Stiles didn't know what to think. This was the second time someone had _shifted_ in front of him and then ran away from him in fright. Was it typical of the were-mouse genus to do this? But why in front of Stiles? And what did _grim_ have to do with it? 

What did she mean by saying grim? Was his face grim? Are they grim? Was it something else? Did he mishear her?

Stiles didn't know. What he did know was that now he had a clue. Grim, it had to mean something. The first were-mouse was stuttering when he ran screaming away from him yesterday. Maybe he was trying to say grim as well? If so, then that makes it two were-mice who were saying the same thing after their faces suddenly _shifted_ in front of him. It had to mean something.

For now, Stiles just concentrated on going through the books at hand in the library. He just added grim to the list of things he was searching the books for.

It was as he was settling in to dig into the books that his phone beeped with a text message. It was Scott. Derek had turned Erica. He was creating his own pack. Like Peter was.

Stiles was unsure how to feel about this. Derek could be going power mad. Maybe being the Alpha changed something in him. Or, maybe he's lonely and wanted a family again. Either way, it set Scott against Derek and Stiles was being forced to choose a side. 

If Scott was going to be upset at Stiles seeking help from Derek _before_ , he was going to be _livid_ now.

Sitting down on the ground with his back leaning against the bookcase, Stiles sighed and wondered what he was going to do now about his were-creature issue.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been a LOOOONG time coming. I originally wrote this back in August and it has sent back and forth from me to Anna to me to Andy to me to Anna. Double and triple checking every change that was made. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy the work we put into this chapter.

Day four of _The Kidnapping_ starts off with Stiles being woken up by his dad leaving early in the morning. Stiles, knowing what has his dad so anxious to get to work early in the morning, just rolls back over in bed to go back to sleep. "Kick some ass," Stiles mumbles into his pillow as his dad leaves.

Last night, after his dad had come back to the hotel, he was in a bad mood. The good news about the case had been dashed as something unexpected had popped up. His dad hadn't said exactly what but Stiles knew it had pretty much trashed their case against the prime suspect(s). 

Stiles could only stand his dad's moping for so long before he butted in. So as they ate their food Stiles started asking questions about the case. "What happened?"

His dad had this look that he would wear when he noticed that Stiles had one of his wild ideas and was trying to get him to follow along. It was the look that spoke of how much he knew it wasn't a good idea to listen. It would feed Stiles' ego, but at the moment he had nowhere else to turn to. So Stiles wasn't surprised when his dad hadn't immediately started sharing information. "Oh come on, dad. You know you work better when you have someone to bounce questions and answers off of. It's why Sherlock needs his blogger."

Exasperation was a feeling a person got to know intimately when they were around Stiles and his father was the king of invoking it in his words when responding to him. "You need to stop watching so much TV Stiles. Not everything in the real world works as if in a TV show." 

Stiles snorts. "You say that because you don't want to share information with me because you think your new colleagues might not like it. But you know that cops share information with each other and family to get ideas on what they missed." Stiles waves his hands around as he tries to explain, "it's just like with writers. They always need someone to read over their work to show their mistakes–" His dad flinches a little. "–and where they are brilliant and should focus more of their time at in working on the plot and character development."

His dad looks at him, a real long hard _look_. The look speaks of him slowly falling to Stiles' demands. Stiles knows that his dad is close to breaking and so stays completely still. It takes everything he has to not move a muscle as he is anxious and giddy, wanting to jump up and down in excitement with helping his dad with a _real_ case. _Come on, dad. You know you want to._

With a sigh showing how much the burden of the world is laid upon his shoulders his dad caves, "Fine."

Stiles tries to hold back, he really does, but he can't help it and jumps up and down in joy. "Tell me everything," Stiles says with a maniacal gleam in his eyes.

With the file spread out across the little table, they go over the case. Stiles notices that while there are patterns in the method of killing, with some slight differences, that the victims themselves are different. "You said this killer is a sexual predator who has a set target, right?"

His dad flinches at the words _sexual predator_ and Stiles knows it's because his dad wants to protect him from the grisliness of the world. It's his father's instinct to protect his child even from something as innocuous as the idea of the type of bad guys out there in the real world. "Yes. At first the pattern seemed to be brunette women with brown eyes, average weight and height."

"The eye color didn't matter?" Stiles asks curious as he notices that not all the women had brown eyes.

His dad hesitates slightly as he tries to think how to explain the case to Stiles without getting too deep into the method of death. "It didn't seem to, no. Some of the victims had different colored eyes but some had the same." 

Stiles taps one of the pictures of a victim and thinks about what sparked the killer(s)' interest and why the eye colors didn't really matter. "Could it have been colored contact lenses? Maybe he saw them with colored contacts when he picked them?" 

Stiles' dad leans back in his chair and runs his hand through his hair. "We thought the same at first but we noticed that they didn't have a contact prescription nor did we find contacts on their person or around their residences. Or any evidence that they might have even worn them."

Stiles takes the new information in. "So the eye color doesn't matter."

"No it doesn't," his father puts the nail in the coffin of that theory.

Something had to get the killers' attention. If the eyes didn't matter then something else did. Serial killers had types and once they settled into them they would rarely change up. "What about the hair?" Stiles went on, "You mentioned that the pattern seemed to be following brunette women of average height and weight." Stiles taps on another picture of a victim, "Was it the hair color that mattered?"

His gets up to get another drink. "We think so. One of the victims had blonde hair at the time of her death but it was discovered that she was naturally a brunette."

_Say what?!_ Stiles jerked up, shocked. The pictures of the victims he saw were brunettes. "You think the killer knew that? Knew that she was originally a brunette?"

His dad takes a sip of his drink. "We're under that impression, yes."

_This changes things. How did the killer know?_ "So either the killer knew her personally." Then Stiles thinks on it again, "Or he was watching her before she colored her hair."

His dad nods. 

Stiles thinks on this. Of which scenario is more likely? "When did she color her hair?"

His dad's voice is level as he tells him, "Two months before she died."

_Damn_ "Damn." _Two months is a long time to stalk someone. But if he did do that..._ "Where is she in this pattern? At the beginning, end, or middle?" If she was killed more towards the beginning of the victim list then it is more likely that the victim was someone the killer(s) knew. If not, then it shows how determined the killer(s) is to have stalked their victim upwards of two months prior to their death.

Stiles can see that his dad sees where he is going with this. "She's number five. Towards the middle."

_Five? Towards the middle? What the fuck?_ "The middle? How many have you tied to him?" Stiles asks as he starts to look through the victim profiles more closely.

His dad hands him a folder. "Ten, including the men."

Stiles pauses. _Men? Men and women?_ "Men? I thought you said this was a sexual predator? He goes after men too or were they caught at the same scene or opportunistic killings?" Stiles sees that the folder his dad handed him was one of the male victims. 

His dad points to a section of the folder. "Separate scenes. No connection to the women either."

_No connection? Then why were they killed? Were they targeted as well?_ Stiles speaks calmly meeting his dad's eyes as he asks his dad the question, "Sexually assaulted as well?"

He knew it would upset his dad but seeing him take a swallow before speaking hesitantly still sent a flash of pain through Stiles' chest."Yeah."

Stiles knows the best thing to do is to pretend he didn't see it. Right now he is not supposed to be Stiles Stilinski, son of his father, but his partner whom he can share his case with."Same pattern as the women? Average height and weight with brunet hair?"

"No," his father denies his theories.

_No? Then how are they related? Just the method of death?_ "No? Then how did you tie their deaths to the deaths of the women?"

His father picks up another folder and flips it open to a specific page."Same pattern in the manner of their death and the type of weapon used."

Stiles looks at the open folders. He notes his dad took out the pictures of the bodies. Probably not ready for him to see that kind of stuff yet. Stiles has seen the burnt crusty body of Peter Hale and the various victims of his. A little blood and guts is not going to make him lose his lunch or get upset. But this is different. This isn't just about the violence of the victims' death but the sexual component to it. His dad is still trying to protect him and Stiles let's him by ignoring the missing evidence and continuing with his questions. "So you're thinking what? Same guy? Or more than one killer working together?"

His dad sits back in his chair looking up at Stiles. "We were thinking a pair of killers. Maybe a man and a woman or two men. They each pick a victim of their type."

It sounds plausible and Stiles knows that it's been done before. But if this was the case then why was his dad so upset? Why wasn't their theory working out? "And the problem is?"

"The main suspect has no one close to him who would fit the profile." Stiles knows his dad says main suspect but it's more than that. Looking at his dad, as he sits in his chair touching his coffee cup and the crinkled lines on his face with his hard set eyes, Stiles can tell that he believes this guy, this main suspect, did it. His dad is upset because he knows who the killer is but he just can't prove it yet. 

Looking at the evidence again, the folders, the pictures Stiles tries to think of what else or who else it could be. "Are you sure it's a male killing them?"

The lines at the corner of his dad's face get deeper as he slowly carefully says, "Sexual predator, Stiles."

Stiles hands move in connection with his words. "I know that. But what makes you think it wasn't a woman with a dildo or something?"

Stiles' dad looks at him in shock at what just came out of his mouth. It was a familiar look for Stiles except this time it was tinged with the bright red of the horror of a father discovering his son knew about sex and sex toys. "Stiles!"

Stiles rubs the back of his head slightly as his cheeks start to redden in embarrassment. "What, it's a perfectly reasonable question to ask when you're trying to eliminate suspects."

His father squeaks in a horrified embarrassed manner, "That may be, but I don't want to hear about that from you!"

Stiles looks and calmly replies, "I'm sixteen dad. I knew about sex and sex toys and safe sex since middle school. Sex ed programs, TV, and the internet, plus _the talks_ we had kind of ended the whole innocence of my mind."

Stiles' dad sits there stupefied. He forgot all of that. He still wants to think of Stiles as his little boy. At least until he goes to college.

Stiles looks back at the folders. As much as he wants to crawl under the covers in embarrassment of the conversation, there are more important matters to discuss. "Back to the case. Did you think it might be a woman with sex toys or other implements in which to do object rape?"

A long moment of pause as his dad tries to reason with himself. "Yes."

Stiles looks up. "You did?"

"Yeah," his dad says. "It was one of the theories that Portland PD were investigating, as far-fetched as it seemed, they didn't want to rule anything out. It is one of the reasons that they had the theory that one of the killers, if it is a two-person team doing this, is a woman. Yet, the coroner found miniscule evidence of sperm in one of the more recent victims, a male, from where a condom used in the rape broke. The DNA in it matched one of my cold cases, a female victim, which is why I'm here." 

"These rapes, they happened when the victims were alive?" Stiles asked, wanting to be sure exactly what type of sexual predator they were looking at.

Stiles' dad looks at him with his eyes narrowed. "Yes."

"So you have both male and female victims who were sexually assaulted by a male and then killed in the same manner, correct?" Stiles asked his dad.

Stiles' dad nods. 

Stiles taps his finger on the table as he looks at pictures of the victims. Something was prickling in his mind. Something that said you know this. "Did the male and female victims differ in their looks, not just hair color?"

Stiles' dad nods again. "The male victims had an athletic build and blond hair. The female victims in contrast had brunette hair, didn't have athletic builds, although they were in shape."

Stiles thought about it. It did sound like there were two different types of victims. "When you say athletic build, do you mean the type of guys who went to the gym and took care of their bodies?"

Stiles' dad sounded unsure of where Stiles was taking this new line of questioning as he answered,"Yeah."

Stiles got a flashback of Danny in his head. "Were they gay?"

Stiles' dad looked at the one of the pictures of the victims and then back up at Stiles' face. "What are you thinking, Stiles?"

Stiles cleared his throat a bit before speaking trying to make sure what he was thinking about the victims and their killers would be properly articulated as the idea came to him. "Well, if you're thinking that it's two men who teamed up to kill the type of victim that they each liked, then maybe the victims themselves moved in the same sort of dating circles?"

_Same sort of dating circles?_ Stiles could see that question in his father's mind just by the expression on his face. "Stiles what do you mean by 'dating circles'?"

"Well typically a stalker goes after someone who could reciprocate their feelings, right? So a straight man goes after a straight woman. Maybe he got brushed off by her and fixates on her?" Stiles looks up with an awkward, hopeful look on his face.

Stiles' dad rubs his hand across his face and sighs. "That could be a theory, but the sexual orientation of the men and women vary."

That's interesting to Stiles. "They vary? How?"

As Stiles asks his questions, his dad listens on with interest and starts thinking that maybe Stiles has a viable idea. "One of the women was in a committed relationship with her wife. A few of the men were gay."

Typically in serial killers there is something about the victims that attracts the killer's attention. Something about them speaks to some need that the killer has that has to be addressed. It's how criminal profilers are able to put together a composite of the killer, their motivations, their modus operandi, the type of victims they go after. There is something that unites the victims into a single category and it is that commonality between them that enables the profilers to figure out how to catch the killer by finding out who they might target next. 

The fact that the commonality was different between the men and women speaks to something about the killer(s). As well is the indication of the victim's sexual orientation. 

It is here that Stiles finally figures out what it is that is stumping the officers. Why they can't see how everything fits. The victims themselves don't matter. They are just the means in which the killer is able to address that darkness inside themselves. They are objects to fill his need. "So it didn't matter what gender the victims were attracted to, it mattered which one the killer was."

Stiles' dad looks at Stiles as he sees the proverbial gears turning in his son's head. "That's what we figure."

Stiles gazes at the photos of the victims. He moves them around putting them into separate categories, men and women. There is something that unites them."And you can't tie the main suspect to the victims because you need a second killer because of the two types of the victims. Male and female." That's the breaking point. Why men and women as victims? Why both of them?

Stiles' dad nods his head.

Why exactly do they need two male killers? Or a man and a woman team that only lets the man rape the victims. _It doesn't make sense. Why two of them?_ Stiles wonders, tapping his fingers on the table as he looks at the two piles of photos. "They're all killed in the same manner?"

"Basically," Stiles' dad answers as he looks at the pictures. _He's sees something there._

Stiles has a thought. The only criteria that is making the officers look for two killers is the two types of victims."If the victims were all the same gender what would you think of the killer?"

_What?_ Stiles' dad lowers his brows, "Stiles what are you talking about?"

Stiles pauses a second, looking at his dad thoughtfully, "You think that there has to be two people involved because the victims are both males and females, right? But why does there have to be two killers?"

Stiles' dad is still unsure of what Stiles is getting at. "What...?"

Stiles starts to get anxious as he tells his dad his theory. "So far, you have got the same method of killing involved in each murder. You have the same manner in which they died." Stiles starts to wave his hands around as he communicates his idea to his dad, "Why would someone pick a victim and then let someone else kill them for them?" This is the part that never made sense to Stiles, why let someone else do the deed for them. "Are they voyeuristic? But then how'd they assert themselves over their victims? Assert their power over them?" Isn't that the whole reason why killers pick their targets? To show the victim that they have control to let them live, to let them die, to choose the method in which their victim will die. It is all about asserting dominance over them. How can the killer assert themselves over the victim they chose if they aren't participating in it? How? What is the payoff to the killer?

Stiles' dad can see that Stiles' theory is on the tip of his tongue. He can see the moment in which everything is about to change. So he asks his son, "What are you thinking?"

Stiles gets a big grin on his face as he finally articulates what he has been trying to explain to his dad. "What if there's only one killer? What if there's only person picking the victims. Both the men and the women?"

Stiles dad sees where his son is going and at once it feels as if it is the most complicated theory and yet the most simple. Occam's Razor showing itself once more. "…Stiles are you saying...?"

Stiles interrupts his dad bursting with excitement and blathering off his theory as fast as he can. "What if your killer is bisexual? He has a certain type for his female victims, average height and weight with brunette hair and another for his men who are athletic in shape and blond? Just because someone is bisexual doesn't mean they don't have a type."

_Bisexual? A type? What did he mean?_ "A type?"

"Yeah. I mean you could have a bisexual male who likes red-headed women with deep brown eyes and average height and weight with genius level intellect and then he likes his men to be more leaner, meaner, with short dark brown hair and green eyes and maybe a little denser in the brains." Stiles scratches his head and his cheeks pinken a little in embarrassment as he realizes who he was describing. Derek is always at the front of his mind lately. _Damnit. Nothing to think deeply on here dad. Just me blathering. Don't think of Derek. Don't think of Derek. It's Danny. Please think it's Danny. Please. Please. Think it's Danny._

Stiles' dad looks at him. A tingle of slight foreboding goes up his spine at hearing his son's theory. It sounded too polished to just be a thought at random and the details of the descriptions of the types has him feeling as if he recognizes who he could be describing. The girl fits Lydia Martin, he knows that. But the guy doesn't fit a description of anyone he knows his son hangs out with. Yet, he feels as if he should know who it describes. 

Stiles still has a bit of pink in his cheeks and he hopes his dad is thinking that it is because of his massive crush on Lydia. "What? I'm just saying. Just because someone likes both genders doesn't mean he likes them to look the same."

His dad thinks on this. His pondering thoughts being vocalized with a questioning tone as he works through it in his head. "Bisexual, with different victim profiles for his different tastes."

Stiles nods. "Yeah, exactly that." Stiles looks at his dad, "It's the simplest explanation, right? You are certain that this guy did it. But because you think two people are involved and there's no one near him who could fit the profile of the other killer you think something else is wrong. But you know it's him, right?"

"Bisexual." He knows it will fit the profile better, but it's still the thought of the killer being bisexual and having different types of victims that is throwing him. The simplest answer is that it is him, but it's almost unheard of. He's certainly never heard of anything like this before. But maybe that is why he's never heard it before. The rest just got away with it because no one thought about it in this way before.

Stiles is a little frustrated at his dad's preoccupation about the killer being bisexual. "Dad why're you so hung up on that? Not all serial killers are straight men you know. [Jeffery Dahmer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Dahmer) was as gay as he could be and targeted gay men and little boys." Stiles shivers at the reminder of how so many of his victims met their end. Horrible, painful deaths and then the way the bodies were disposed of... The worst part was about the teenager who nearly got away. If the cops weren't homophobic bigots having a lark that kid  and many others would still be alive today. 

 "There's also been some female serial killers. Even lesbians ones. So why's a bisexual serial killer so far of a stretch?" Stiles reminded his dad, just to make sure he got it in his head that this isn't so far out of the realm of possibility. "Anyone can kill. Anyone can get the taste for it. Why does gender and sexuality matter so much to determine if a person is more or less likely to be a serial killer?"

Stiles can see the moment his dad starts to grudgingly agree with him. "You're right. It does make more sense and there's no reason to not go with it.”

Stiles' sits up straighter and snarks, "Of course I am. Can you say it again so I can recall it over and over again in my mind during the times you are upset at me and doubt my expertise?"

His dad looks at him.

Stiles' speaks with an innocent questioning tone, "What?"

With a tone of exasperated fondness Stiles' dad tells him, "Go to sleep Stiles. It's late."

Stiles knows it's late. His dad came home late anyway and they have been going over the case for quite a while. It might even be considered early early morning. Which is why his tone is worried when he gets up from the table and asks his dad, "You're going to bed soon too, right?"

"In a little bit." Stiles' dad answers as he rearranges the files into their proper order.

Stiles taps his fingers on the top of the chair at the table. "You aren't taking this information to the detectives right away?"

Stiles' dad looks at his watch and answers as he gets out his pad of paper for his notes on the case and opens up a file to look at it again with a new set of eyes. "It's late, they're probably asleep and I want to go over my notes again before I take it to them."

Stiles walks away from the table a few steps but turns as a niggling thought in mind needs to be answered. "You think it's a viable theory, right?"

Stiles' dad looks up and answers, "Yeah, I do."

"Are you proud of me?" Stiles asks unsure if he really wants to know but with everything going on recently and all the lies and misdirections he's been giving him; he just wants to know that he hasn't ruined everything with his dad.

His dad looks up with a slight grin on his face and speaks fondly, "Yeah Stiles, I'm proud of you."

Stiles' face lights up like it's Christmas morning and he can unwrap his gifts now. He runs back the few steps he taken away from the table and tightly hugs his dad and then goes to get ready for bed.

Even now, hours later lying in bed half-awake after being woken up by his dad leaving for work he feels the giddiness in his chest over his dad being proud of him. His dad's approval has always meant the world to him even when he was younger and his mom was around. Hugging one of the pillows close to his chest with a slight grin on his face he goes back to sleep.

When Stiles wakes up later he is hungry. He slept in past noon and his stomach is growling for nourishment. Stiles sends off a text to his dad to tell him he was going to lunch at the cafe again and if he should pick up food for them to eat tonight. His dad texts back ten minutes later that he was wrapped up in the case and didn't expect to be back until late so not to get him anything.

The walk this time to _Dingo Baby_ was different from the past few days. He _felt_ eyes on him like he was being watched. It didn't matter how often he would stop and look at shop windows to use their reflection, he couldn't see who was watching him. 

The hair on the back of his neck was standing on end. His breath was coming a little quicker and his pulse was a little faster. Adrenaline was pumping through his veins. He was being watched and by someone who knew how to hide. 

Stiles tried to pretend that everything was fine but he knew it wasn't working. He got a few glances from people on the street. He looked hurried, nervous, and a little paranoid. The fact he kept stopping abruptly at store shops to look into the windows and then hurry off again didn't help any to dissuade that.

When he got to the café he bought his usual order and sat at the very back of the café with his back to the wall so he could watch who was coming in and out of the café. He knew it was paranoid and maybe it wouldn't even change anything as his watcher might not come in, but it felt like the right thing to do. It was a fool's hope but it did make him feel better. He set up his laptop and he started his search for information on the strange happenings in Portland once more. 

Yesterday at the library he got some hints from the were-mice lady who ran off on him. _Grim_. It had to mean something. 

Typing Grim into the search engine produced some interesting results. But nothing that was tied to anything supernatural or were-animals. Mostly it was definitions of the word and mythos on the Grim Reaper and Death Personified. 

Then Stiles had a thought what if these were-animals were saying something that sounded like grim but was spelled differently? 

He tried grym, grymm, groim,gryn, grin, gryn gyrim, and various other spellings. Most of it turned up nothing interesting or weren't related to anything supernatural. The one variation that he tried that popped up anything interesting was _grimm_. Multitudes of links related to the Grimm Brothers and their fairy tales popped up, many of them were links to translated copies of the original series of books. There was so many links of the same information that Stiles just gave up searching through the thousands of pages of results.

Every word variation of _grim_ he tried gave him nothing. Nothing that could be tied to the supernatural. Nothing about why the were-animals would scream that at him and then run off. Nothing about anything at all that could be used to identify them.

Either Stiles was lost looking for a needle in a haystack without knowing what the needle looked like or there just wasn't any information online. Which didn't make sense. He found out about werewolves through his research. Why can't he find out about the other were-animals? 

Is there a darknet in which the information is passed on? Or is it just that because so few can see them that no one else has written about them?

Or maybe grim or grimm wasn't connected to any of this? Maybe he just misheard them or they weren't speaking English or it was just an utterance in fear. It didn't make any sense but it was the best that Stiles could come up with since he couldn't identify what they were.

Why was he able to see it and no one else? What made him different?

He needs to go back to the library. He found a were-mouse there yesterday maybe he can find her again. Ask her what is going on. Answers have to be found somewhere.

Stiles orders up another take-out meal for dinner and goes back to his hotel. The whole time he is walking there he feels those eyes on him. 

Once he arrived at the hotel and put the food in the fridge Stiles debated on whether or not to go to the library. He doesn't know who is following him or what they may want and if he will be safe. But the situation is pestering him. He's not going to let anyone intimidate him. He needs his answers and he's going to go out there and get them.

Unfortunately, even when he gets to the library there are no were-animals he can find around him and the books don't hold the answers. Not with the few clues he has. For the hell of it he asks for a copy of the Grimm Brother's Fairy Tales but they are checked out at the moment. 

Nothing was found. No answers to his questions. And the sense that he was being watched never left him. Not in the cafe, not in the hotel, and not in the library. Goosebumps are crawling up and down his arms. He doesn't like this. Not one fucking bit.

Even when he is back in his hotel room with the door locked and the curtains over the windows closed he can still feel eyes on him. Stiles still feels his skin crawling with goosebumps. A feeling of foreboding fills him. It doesn't feel right. It doesn't feel safe. 

It's been hours since he got back from the library. The sun has gone down and searching online to take his thoughts off the bad feel yields no results. The feeling of being watched hasn't gone away and Stiles is starting to get scared. It's time to ask other people for help.

The question is who does he ask for help? 

Renard? Stiles knows nothing about the man except he might be a supernatural being or creature and that he is a cop, not to mention giving him creepy Peter Hale vibes. 

Nick? He seems to be a normal human who has a positive effect on Renard and whose aunt unfortunately attracted the attention of some bad guys. Nothing that Stiles dug up even answered why people were trying to kill her. It's the great big unknown and with everyone connected to it dead, there will be no answers.

Derek? Well, Scott is pissed at him at the moment. Not to mention there's that whole _I am the Alpha, obey me_ vibe. And of course Stiles totally had this internal narrative where Derek was saying that in his stupid growly sourwolf voice. Which okay, as if he wasn't intimidating enough, his eyes had to glow red on top of looking like a serial killer?

Doc Deaton? Maybe, but Scott knows him better than anyone. As far as Stiles knows, Deaton hasn't said one iota about werewolves since the Peter Hale showdown. Stiles doesn't think that Scott has brought it up yet either. 

Allison? Maybe, but to his knowledge besides werewolves she doesn't really have any knowledge from the hunting archives or her family. It might raise flags for her to ask her parents about it too. Attracting the Argent family's attention is a big no-no right now.

So that leaves Scott. Scott who doesn't really ask questions about anything unless it has to do with things/people around him. Scott who is so very wrapped up in his Allison drama that he doesn't return phone calls half the time. Scott who...is his best friend. So Scott it is.

Stiles sits on his bed staring at his phone thinking about what he is going to say. _Hey Scott, you know how dad kidnapped me to Portland because of the whole mess with helping Isaac escape from custody? Yeah, well it's not going so great. Some really weird stuff is going on and I need your help._ Or, _Scott, have you heard about any sort of invisible were-animals from Derek? Not invisible invisible but that they shift in front of people but most people don't see them? Kind of like a glamour or some illusion thing? Or magic!? Like Harry Potter magic!_

Stiles doesn't know how to ask. He's going to sound crazy either way. Especially when he brings up how he feels that he's being watched all the time now. He knows that he sounds paranoid but he can't shake it. Someone or something out there is hunting him. He can feel it in his bones.

Stiles picks up the phone and it rings and rings and when he finally hears the click that lets him know that Scott is listening, Stiles just spills everything out. "Scott _thank god_ you're there. I need your help. Something strange's going on here in Portland and I think someone or something's hunting me and –" 

"Stiles. Calm down. Explain more slowly. What do you mean you need help?" Stiles was interrupted by the person who picked up the phone. But it wasn't Scott at the other end like he'd hoped. It was Derek. And really, it was always Derek wasn't it?

Stiles felt a surge of relief hit him. Derek answered. Derek was with Scott, _How the hell did that happen? I thought Scott was ignoring Derek? Did they fight or something? Derek is breathing a little heavy._


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it. The scene that started it all. 
> 
> The minute I saw episode 3 of season 2 and Derek kicks Scott's ass I had this image of Scott's phone ringing and Stiles at the other end needing help. I always had Derek coming to his rescue.
> 
> I hope you enjoy this chapter as much I enjoyed creating it. It most certainly could not have been done without my amazing betas, Anna (Just_a_pinch) and Andy. You also have them to blame for the three month wait. Well, real life issues in their lives keeping them busy. You also have them to thank for this chapter being as wonderful as it is.

Derek stood at the center of the rink after having thoroughly trounced Scott at his feeble and brash attempt of a challenge against Derek. He had just started to walk away when he heard Scott's phone ring. Derek paused his footsteps, recognizing it as the tune that Stiles had set for himself on Scott's cell phone. Isaac had told him earlier that Stiles wasn't in school and didn't know where he was. He didn't have his phone number and Scott refused to tell them. 

Derek bent down to pick up the phone and sent a sharp look at Scott telling him not to do anything and answered the phone.

"Scott _thank god_ you're there. I need your help. Something strange is going on here in Portland and I think someone or something is hunting me and –" 

_Needed help? Hunting him?_ Derek cut off Stiles' rambling with a clear order. "Stiles. Calm down." Derek took a short breath and then continued calmly, "Explain, slowly. What do you mean you need help?"

Derek could hear Stiles take a deep, calming breath over the phone. "My dad was pissed after Isaac escaped. He went and volunteered to work a case in another state and took me with him."

That explained why he disappeared, but not why he was in danger. Derek realized that Stiles was just filling the void with unnecessary information as he tried to explain the full situation and that wasn't what was needed, so he testily replied, "Stiles. Get to the point. Not blabbering about your melodramatic hissy fit over being punished by your dad."

Stiles spoke in a petulant tone. "Punished for helping _you_ , I might add!"

Derek's voice was clear and filled with warning, "Stiles."

Derek could hear Stiles take another deep breath and prepared himself for another rant. "I'm seeing things. Things no else around me is seeing. I'm also being watched." 

"What _things_ , are you seeing?" Derek asked, concerned, the frown highly pronounced. _Other shifters? A Kanima? Something else?_ "What do mean you're being watched?" Derek asked a little more loudly than intended and Derek could hear the silence in the rink as the betas around him listened in on the conversation. Even Scott, who had been trying to sit up in an effort to try to grab back his phone, had stopped and was staring at Derek.

Derek could hear the fear and confusion in his voice, "I was walking down the street the other day. I bumped into this guy. He started to shift." Stiles quickly added, "Not like you guys." Stiles took a small breath and swallowed as if the next words would be difficult to say "He was suddenly shaking his head back and forth and this clear film-like veil disappeared and underneath it was something not human. The really freaky part was that no one else noticed." _No one noticed? At all?_ Derek started to get worried. "I'm on the sidewalk of a busy street, dozens of people around me and no ones notices that a middle-aged man suddenly turned into a were-mouse!"

"Were-mouse?" Derek choked out, surprise evident in his voice. He sent a sharp warning look to Isaac when he heard him chuckle. A were-mouse might sound funny to the uninformed but with no one else seeing them when they transformed could mean only one thing. _Wesen_ , Derek thought with mounting dread.

"Well, he's a type of were, right? Like you guys? A shape-shifter?" Stiles sounds as if he's looking for reassurance, that this were-mouse is a possibility, that this isn't something to be afraid of. All Derek can do is think that he needs more information because if it is Wesen... If it's Wesen, then _bad_ things are going to happen and Stiles will be in the thick of it. 

Derek speaks carefully, fearing the answers to the questions he has, "You said no one else noticed? Did he say anything?"

"I'm not sure. It may have been something with a g, but he was stuttering and ran off." _Something with a g?_ Derek feels his heart start to beat a little faster. He can hear his betas turn to him with their full attention. They can hear the pace of his heart pick up and it's a signal to them that something is wrong, something is putting Stiles in danger.

Derek takes a calming breath. Foolishly trying to force the universe to conform to his thinking, his wants and desires. _It might be nothing, just another type of shifter I haven't heard about._ He takes another breath, trying to center himself and calm his heart down. _It's not, it can't be..._ Stiles continues, "But the girl one I ran into in the library said grim before she ran off."

The very moment that Stiles spoke the word _Grimm_ Derek felt panic in a way he hadn't felt since the night of the fire. Fear, urgency and worry erupt in him. Derek could have sworn his heart stopped, but he knows it hasn't. He feels it pound even faster in his chest as his body fills with adrenaline that rushes through him. 

Derek's betas pick up on Derek's emotions and a feeling of danger and he can hear Erica and Isaac picking themselves up. He can hear Boyd on top of the Zamboni looking around for a threat and he can hear Scott's heartbeat pick up as well.

Derek knows what he has to do. He must confirm it even though he knows what he heard. Even though he knows what this means. He has to have it confirmed to kill all of his doubt and hope that he heard it wrong, he must destroy it in order to prepare himself and his pack for what is to come. When Derek speaks it is with an utter calm that is completely opposite of what he feels, "Stiles, repeat just what you told me. Slowly."

"The girl were-mouse I ran into at the library yesterday said the word grim before she ran off." The hair on the back of his neck stood up as the word he was dreading was repeated. He could no longer deny it. _Stiles is a Grimm._ It reverberates inside his head like a ringing bell he can't stop.

In the face of such drastic and detrimental information, Derek was proud of himself for being able to keep his voice steady, "You said you were being watched. Are you sure?"

Derek could hear Stiles' voice shake as he told him, "I saw a were-lizard yesterday across the street. He looked right at me Derek. He knew I could see him."

Dread turns Derek's veins to ice. "Shit." 

Stiles' voice is low and soft with a touch of fear. "Derek?" There is a pause and Derek knew if Stiles was in this room Derek would be able to smell the stench of Stiles' terror. "This is bad, right?"

Derek slips into his Alpha persona to keep control of the situation. Information was what was important now and keeping Stiles calm enough to provide it was vital. "Where are you, right now?"

Stiles' voice catches, "My hotel room."

Derek took a breath, turned to look at Scott and saw the worry plain on his face with the other betas starting to follow suit as they realized the situation going on. They could hear the phone conversation with Stiles and they knew that someone or something was after him. "I want you to lock yourself in your room. Find a way to block the door, use a chair or dresser." Derek didn't want to think about how flimsy a protection it would be. Only seconds or minutes would be gained by that depending on which type of Wesen came after Stiles. "You need a weapon, find a knife, break off a leg of a chair or table, just get something." Derek could hear Stiles' breathing pick up as he caught on to the fact that he really was in trouble. "I want you to keep calm Stiles. You can't panic. I'm coming to get you."

Stiles sucked in a breath and squeaked out, "Derek, my dad's here too."

Derek Hale, visiting the Sheriff's underage son in their hotel room? That could be a problem. "In the room?"

"No," Stiles breathed out. He took a quick breath. "He's at the police department." Stiles paused and warned Derek, "Derek if I disappear from my room he's going to go nuts."

Derek knew that was very likely but the alternative was worse. Stiles' infamous trouble magnet aura had attracted some Wesens' attentions and while the first two were benign citizens, he also attracted some unwanted ruthless type as well. This could go very badly. The more ruthless type of Wesen weren't kind to the Grimms they found. In fact they were more of the position to torture and kill any and all Grimms they found. 

"We'll deal with it when I get there. For now, just prepare yourself." Derek took a breath as the next order was going to be tough. He was Stiles' lifeline at the moment and to tell him to hang up was going to drive Stiles into panic mode. "I'm going to hang-up, after I do that I need you to text me the address of the hotel and then I want you to have the local police department on speed dial."

Derek could hear Stiles' heartbeat pick up even more as the worry registered over the phone, "Derek, do you think–?"

With a level, even voice Derek calmly relays to Stiles, "Stiles. I'm coming." But his voice betrays him as speaks the next word, "Ju–st wait for me."

Stiles' voice is meek as he answers with a single syllable. "'kay."

Derek ends the call. He takes a quick breath and tosses it to Scott who is now in the process of trying to stand up as he's still injured and it hurts to move. The anger at Scott's challenge still sits uneasy within Derek which is why he is brusque when he commands him, "Get over to Deaton's, get yourself patched up, and await my orders."

Scott's face turns distinctly unhappy at the words _await my orders_. Stiles is his friend and Derek isn't _his_ Alpha to be able to tell him what to do. But the worry wins out over the anger. Stiles comes first. But that isn't enough to stop him from questioning Derek over what the hell just happened. "What's going on? Why's Stiles in trouble?"

Derek knows that Scott is worried about Stiles but there is a certain sadistic glee in telling Scott, "Nothing you can handle. I'm going to help him. You focus on getting yourself healed." 

Switching his attention to the other betas, he gives them their orders, "You three go home. Sit tight and wait for my call. I'll be back as soon as I can."

Scott's voice echoes as he yells at Derek, "Derek! Tell me what's going on! Damnit Derek, he's my best friend!"

With a certain ruthlessness towards Scott's childish behavior, Derek tells him the truth. "Scott the more you _delay me_ the more time it will take to get to Stiles and _prevent_ him from getting _killed_." He turns around and stares at Scott as that sinks in, "Now do you want to have another fight here or do you want me to go _save_ Stiles?" 

Derek hears the quiet gasp from Erica, "Stiles is going to die?" It reminds him of the urgency of the situation and he turns and starts to walk away and tosses out, "I'm leaving. You have your orders. Reach me if anything changes." 

The door slams shut behind Derek, the sound echoing in the quiet rink. The four of them stand staring at the spot where Derek's back used to be. They look at each other fleetingly and then quickly go do as Derek commanded.

Derek could hear the ring tone of the text message arriving as he walked out of the building to his Camaro. He checked with the details on the hotel address as he got in and text Stiles back to reiterate that he was on his way and drove off like a bat out of hell. 

The knowledge that Stiles is a Grimm is distressing. Stiles never had the persona of the Grimms that he was told about as a child. Grimms didn't care to make a distinction between Wesen and shifters and many a time a Grimm would take the head off a werewolf instead of a Blutbaden. They also didn't care to learn the difference between the two since to them they were all inhuman and deserved to die. 

The knowledge that Stiles is part of the blood thirsty line of hunters that make the Argents look tame and civilized is something that Derek still can't quite accept. It's not the fear that Stiles might endanger them, it's _Stiles_ after all, but it's the other part of being a Grimm. Not only are they hunters but they are also hunted as well.

There is no middle ground for Grimms. If Grimms don't fall into line of accepting orders then they're marked for death by the Royal Families. _Reapers, what if it's Reapers Stiles saw?_ Derek feels shivers race down his spine at the thought and has to physically shake it off. He can't think about that. He can't think about the danger that Stiles is in. What he needs to do is drive, just _get_ there.

Derek won't do Stiles any good if he gets distracted by his thoughts and crashes his car. _Damnit Stiles, why is it_ always _you?_

Derek drives until his gas gets low and pulls over to a gas station to refill. While there he decides to call Stiles to check on him. The phone rings and rings and goes to voice mail. A small susurration begins in the back of his mind and he stubbornly pushes it away. He calls again and again with the same result, voice mail. The susurration getting louder. 

Derek stands there with the phone in his hand thinking about the situation. _Maybe he's on the phone with Scott._ He calls Scott who picks up on the third ring and tersely asks, "Did Stiles call you?" 

Scott's voice is confused as he answers, "What? No. I haven't talked to him. Derek what's going on?"

The small susurration becomes louder as a murmurer. Derek in frustration tells Scott, "Nothing. Just call me if he calls you." He ends the call and leans his body back against the side of his car as he continues to pump gas in. He tilts his head up looking at the metal roof, _He's just busy. The phone battery died. Something...not...not that._

The pump clicks, Derek puts the the pump in its slot, screws in the gas cap, and gets in his car. Once more he tries to call Stiles. Again, it goes to voice mail. The murmurer becomes a solid voice softly calling to Derek. He pushes it away turns on the radio and drives off determined not to think about it.

The drive is long. Twice more he tried to call Stiles. Nothing changed, just the voice mail answering him. When he gets to Portland it's near midnight. He gunned the car speeding through the states to reach the city as fast as he could. He drives through the deserted streets making his way to the hotel.

A block away he sees the lights on top of the cars and his heart stutters. It pounds in his chest as he coasts down the street the lights get brighter as he gets closer to his destination. There's several police cars parked in front of the hotel. Derek drives past the police cars and turns on the next street. He parks away from the hotel, sitting there for a minute trying to figure out what to do. _It could be a coincidence. It might not be..._ Derek slams the thought away before it can sprout. 

He gets out of the car and walks slowly to the hotel making sure to be quiet and not gain attention. He slips in through a side door that was propped open for the police to go in and out. He finds the stairwell and walks up slowly, listening in to any conversations he can hear. It's mostly the susurrus of police chatter and too indistinct to be able to determine what is actually being said. 

The closer he gets to Stiles' floor the more clear the voices become and the stronger and faster his heart beats. His mind is clear by shear force of will to ignore the thoughts that are haunting him with their whispers. 

Derek reaches Stiles' floor and the police chatter becomes clear. He can tell its coming from this floor, that the cops are swarmed on _this_ floor. The voice comes back – yelling at him – but Derek pushes it away. _Just the same floor, not the same room. Not the same room. Not Stiles' room._

Derek places his hand on the door, takes a deep breath to steel himself and opens the door. He glances at the nearest room's door number it's meaningless as Derek realizes he suddenly can't recall Stiles' room number. Derek fumbles through his jacket pockets looking for his phone and glances at the last message he received from Stiles. He compares it to the door he's standing in front of, turns around, and walks off in the other direction. Each step takes him closer to the chatter. He can hear them, talking about the room, how the door had been busted in, DNA evidence found in the room, how they needed to get forensics there and asking where the detectives are and when they are getting here. 

Every step he takes has Derek getting closer to the voices. He can see some uniformed cops now. Their faces are upset and worried. He's close enough to pick up smells. Not just the smells of the cops themselves but of the room they are all congregated in. The sweat, stink of anger, worry, frustration, and fear overwhelms the underlying smell that Derek feels he recognizes.

The whisper speaks to him again and Derek forces it back down.

Derek gets closer to the room and he is twelve feet away when he recognizes several things that cascade to cause the whispering voice in his head to change into a yell. The first is that he recognizes Sheriff Stilinski's voice speaking to the other cops. _Just a coincidence.... It could be part of that case he's working on, the reason he's in Portland. Nothing to do with Stiles._ The second is that he smells something he can't quite identify. It's not human, but it's also not animal, not completely. _Just a Wesen, could've stayed at the hotel._ He sees the room number and knows it's near Stiles' room. _It's not Stiles. It's not Stiles._ Then he smells it, blood. Freshly split blood.

Ever since the gas station, the voice he kept shoving down was repeating one phrase in his mind. Now it was screaming at him. The same words he heard the night of the fire. _You're too late. It's all your fault._

Derek forced it back down and continues his slow trek to Stiles' room. The naïve hope that he could make it in time that he was clinging on to for the whole drive to Portland was gone. Gone, as if it had never existed. All he can feel is rage, anxiety, worry, and fear warring with each other and eating at him. 

As Derek walks past the room, _Stiles' room_ , he dials down his senses of sight, touch, and hearing and focuses everything into his sense of smell. He catches the odor of the strange Wesen he caught earlier and something wolf-like, as well as Stiles' blood. 

It takes all of Derek's willpower to keep from shifting right there in the middle of the hallway surrounded by cops and Sheriff Stilinski and his suspicions just feet away. He forces himself to walk past the room. 

Each step past the room, _Stiles' room_ , was agony and felt increasingly heavier. It was all he could do to not drag his feet while his body and mind warred within him. The feelings of wanting to stay to make sure he had the scent of the bastards who hurt and took Stiles versus the fear of being seen as a suspect and being delayed in finding Stiles took hold of him. Just walking past would not be enough for him to individually hunt them down. Not with all the cops' scents interfering. Derek feared that it would prevent him from being able to find Stiles and he didn't know what he would do if it did.

The voice was screaming at him, _It's all your fault. You were too late, again. It's all your fault. Stiles..._ Even the voice couldn't give name to the fear that caused his heart to freeze the moment he had smelled Stiles' blood from his room.

Then he caught it. A small drop of blood on the carpet hallway. It was Stiles'. Derek took a deep breath catching more of Stiles' scent. He followed it down the hallway and into the stairwell. There was more blood. Just drops here and there. The cops missed it for the moment, concentrated as they were on the room, but they would find it soon.

Derek continues to follow the smell of Stiles', his kidnappers, and blood. To his relief, some of it isn't Stiles'. _Good. Injure them and leave me a trail._ The path leads him out a side door of the hotel. Derek spots a bloodied hand print by the door, it's Stiles'.

Outside, the street light overhead is blinking on and off and casting strange shadows. Derek spots more blood and follows it to where it pools for a bit. _Must've been when they were putting Stiles in the vehicle._

Derek closes his eyes, brings his Alpha self to the foreground, and takes a deep breath trying to catch any distinguishing scent to show him where they went. It's faint, very faint, but he thinks he can trace it. 

Derek runs back to his car, lowers all the windows, and drives back to the spot he caught the scent. He takes another deep breath just to make sure and then he coasts his car down the street going slowly to make sure he doesn't lose the smell. 

It will be difficult to keep track of but Derek thinks he can trace it as long as the weather holds and the winds keep blowing in the right direction. He only hopes he will make it in time to save Stiles. _Hold on Stiles. I'm coming, just hold on. Please, just hold on._


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a semi-finished product. Andy, one of my betas disappeared on me. It's been a month since I heard from her and Anna my other beta suggested I might as well post what we worked on and we can always edit it later when Andy comes back.
> 
> I debated on splitting this into two or three chapters, but I said to hell with it and just posted this really long one. Enjoy.
> 
> Chapter 10 is still being written. It goes back to Stiles pov. It is what happens to him from the moment that he gets off the phone with Derek to the point that he is found. It will be graphic because the kidnappers are not nice people and they don't want a ransom.
> 
> As always, let me know what you think and if you want I'm cool with any of you making a fanfic out of this fanfic or drawing me pretty artwork. Really, you have permission to do just about anything with it as long as you credit me. :D

Nick was working late in the office going over paperwork for a case when a call came in. Because calls are so common, Nick wasn't paying much attention, focusing on his paperwork and letting it blend into white noise. It was out of his mind which is why when there was a flurry of panic as the officer who answered the phone called over a detective and it cascaded from officer to officer as information was passed it took Nick by surprise. 

At first, Nick was unsure what was going on, what could possibly cause this much attention and action that was causing the commotion. He saw the officer who answered the phone hurry past him and he called out at him asking what was going on. Something had to be seriously wrong for this kind of action after the phone call, but there was nothing about it on the police radio. _What's going on?_

Running through Nick's mind was every possible horror situation of a cop's nightmare and he couldn't decide which he would prefer to face as he waited the few seconds for the officer to answer his question. However, the visions he was running through his mind where somehow nowhere near the truth of the situation as the unnerved officer told Nick that the visiting Sheriff from California went back to his hotel after working on a case and found the room sacked. Blood was spattered around on the walls and his son was nowhere to be found. They think it's a kidnapping and it might be connected to the case the Sheriff was working on.

It shamefully took Nick several seconds to a minute to recall that the smart mouthed hyperactive klutz that went toe to toe with his snark and sarcasm with Hank was the Sheriff's kid they were talking about. Is _the Sheriff's kid,_ his conscious corrected in a fleeting bit of hope. _Is._

Nick took a deep breath as he recalled the kid and how he earned Hank's nod of approval. _He_ has _a strange name, a nick name, based on his last name. Sounded something Polish. Stilinski._ Stiles. _That's it, Stiles Stilinski._

There are several types of cases that cops dread more than others. One of them is working on a case involving someone they know. It is especially bad if it is someone they are considerably close to. Because they start to wonder if this was something that could have been prevented if only they knew the person better, if they were aware of the situation, if the person had trusted them enough to come to them for help. 

The very worst thing a cop dreads is cases with kids in them and this case had both a kid involved and a case concerning a person he knows. A kid, a _cop's_ kid was kidnapped from his hotel room that is now sprayed with blood. Not only will this be a big case in involving multiple police departments, politicians like the mayor and even the governors of both states, but it will be a media circus. Not to mention the FBI becoming involved because it's a kidnapping case.

Situations like this and it's an all-hands-on-deck issue so Nick grabs his stuff, gets the address from an officer passing on orders, and heads towards the hotel hoping he can do something to turn this around. Hoping that the worst hasn't happened and he and Hank aren't soon going to get a call alerting them to the kid's body being found. He wants to find this kid alive. He really wants to.

Walking down the stairs, Nick is already on his phone calling Hank to inform him about the situation that a cop's kid was kidnapped and the fact that it was little Stiles with his running mouth and flailing body. Officially they weren't called in yet on the case, but they had met the kid before and knew what he looked like. It would help in the search until they can get a picture out distributed to the other officers.

Time was critical here. Every minute, every hour that passed made it that much closer to changing the kid's fate from that of a kidnapping to a kidnapping and murder. It's unknown if the kidnappers know who they kidnapped – that he's a cop's kid and all that attention that will be brought to the case – or if it was just a grab of opportunity. It's unknown when the kidnappers find out that Stiles is a cop's kid that they will just kill him to save themselves the trouble of dealing with him passing on information to the cops and feds and the risk of being captured. So many kidnapping victims are killed because of situations like that.

A block away from the hotel and Nick can see the lights flashing from the various police cars, ambulance, and police personnel. Even before the moment he steps into the lobby, Nick spots several cops here and there talking to the hotel staff and guests. The walk towards the elevators at the back of the lobby was filled with the white noise of the cops talking to the witnesses.

The moment he steps off the elevator Nick finds Hank waiting by it. Nick could tell he wanted to be here now as much as he did and was putting off the inevitable of facing the room by waiting for him. Nick walks down the hall passing several uniformed cops, forensics techs, and other personnel. Some he recognized, others he didn't. _Must be from other stations._

The atmosphere of the hallway was strange. With the amount of people in a small enclosed area you would think it would be loud but it was actually quiet as everyone spoke in a tone just above whispering as they conversed with each other and conducted interviews with the guests to see if they heard or saw anything. 

Everything so quiet, so still, that to Nick the very act of walking across the carpeted floor was audible to his ears. The few looks in people's eyes as he passed them told him the story, there was a feeling of pessimism in the air as if they were all attending a wake. 

It didn't bode well for the kid, _Stiles, his name_ is _Stiles. You have to keep this in mind Nick. He's not just some case. He's someone you know and you have to think he's still alive out there._

It's when Nick gets to the room in question that he understands why everyone was so quiet and why their eyes were filled with somberness. They don't think Stiles is alive. _God, he's just a kid! What the hell did he do to deserve this?!_

Looking into the room Nick can see Sheriff Stilinski talking with a uniformed cop he doesn't recognize, however, his attention, is constantly looking to the left at the floor . There's a good sized puddle of blood in the Sheriff's view. The techs have measuring tools out and are taking pictures of it. On the wall there is a small splatter of blood and the door has a smeared hand-print dragged across the front. _Not good._

Nick takes a short breath of air and glances at Stilinski's eyes and all he can see is a father who knows something horrible has happened to his son. The years on the force give him the stark knowledge that more than likely his son won't be coming back and it shows in the dark shadows that eat at the iris in his eyes, filling them with sorrow.

Nick clenches his hand tight. He hates moments like these. It's not just the notification of the family members but as well as not being able to comfort the family. His son is gone, their hotel room is trashed, and there is blood, a lot of blood. They can't even give the father some hope that his son will be returned to him, because they all know the statistics, the reality of the situation that they are looking at. There is no ransom note, there has been no phone call, and they don't even know if this was a kidnapping or something else, something worse.

Nick liked Stiles. Liked him and knows in all likely-hood he and Hank were going to be investigating his murder. _Damnit._

Nick takes a deep calming breath. He needs to distance himself from this. He can't over sympathize here and get lost in the emotions of the victim's family. He needs to keep his mind and focus clear to help find the boy...alive or dead. 

_Hopefully alive._

Nick glances at Hank, sees him meet his eyes in a resolved state and they quietly put on the slippers and gloves and walk into the room. 

At the moment they are the highest ranked officers in the room and to put off talking to Stilinski they take a look at the evidence and talk to the techs and the uniformed officers who were the first arrivals. Stilinski has finished talking to the uniformed officer and is just staring at the blood on the wall as the techs work on it. 

Stilinski seems to be in the strange limbo of being aware of everything and nothing at all, shock. He looks like a man who is facing his very worst nightmare and he can't wake himself up. 

It's his job to talk to victims and their families while the trauma and memories are fresh. It's his job to make sure he has all the facts. Even so, for this moment, Nick feels like he is an intrusive asshole to force this distressed father through the questioning once more. But it's his job and it's the only way to find Stiles, so he swallows his feelings and musters on.

The questions come slow and the answers even slower and haltingly as Stilinski has problems keeping his emotions away, tears coming to his eyes, and he finds it difficult to speak. Nick can tell by looking at him that he doesn't think his son is coming back, that he's dead somewhere and they may never find his body. _He's barely holding up._

Nick is about to ask another question when Hank catches his attention. "Excuse me one moment, Sheriff Stilinski."

Nick walks off to where Hank is standing not quite in front of the door. "And?" Hank asks. Nicks shakes his head, "Not him." Hank sighs in relief. 

It always makes Nick feel a little bit like a heel when he is looking at the victims' family members as suspects of the crime and to even interrogate them in their time of grieving but they have to make sure they know everything they can and to find the person responsible. It's even worse when it's one of their own, a fellow brother or sister in blue because they know what you are doing and why.

"So, if not him, then whom?" Hank wonders out-loud. 

Nick shakes his head, "I don't know." He looks back at Stilinski then at the puddle on the floor. "It could be the suspect in the case, but it seems like he doesn't know he's a suspect yet so how can he make a move on a family member of one of the cops investigating? Why choose the visiting Sheriff? Why not someone local? It's not like all the other cops are single and childless either."

"I know," Hank comments. "It doesn't make sense." Hank looks around the room. "The room is pretty messed up. Like a big fight took place. The kid fought back. Do we know yet if the blood is all his?"

"The techs haven't finished collecting the blood samples and they don't have anything to compare it to yet."

"So it could be his." Hank reiterates.

Nick shakes his head. "I don't think so." 

"Oh?" Hank questions.

"The hand-print smear across the door I think might be his. But some of the others I think are of his attackers." Nick points to the furniture around the front of the room by the door. "I think he heard them or knew they were coming and barricaded the door with what he could and then armed himself with a weapon of some sort."

"A barricade?" Hank inquires as he looks over at the door where the furniture would have been piled up and then to where the furniture ended up. "It looks pushed back pretty far, if it was one."

Nick nods, agreeing with Hank, the barricade was pushed quite a ways away from the door. "Which suggests there was more than one attacker, probably several, and they are strong. You saw that door just like I did. If the door jam didn't break off I think the hinges would have come off. There was a lot of force against the door."

Hank agrees with Nick but one thing just doesn't make sense. "Why didn't anyone hear anything?"

Hank's right. There should have been noise complaints. The amount of force it would take to break in the door plus move the barricade like that... It would take several hits over and over and the sound would be loud. Why didn't anyone hear anything? "I don't know. They had to make a lot of noise when they busted in. It couldn't have happened that fast, could it?" Nick questions.

"I–" Hank starts to speak but is interrupted by a uniform officer letting them know that the Captain is on the floor.

Nick looks at Hank, Stilinski, the rest of the room, and then back at the door and the remains of the barricade. He has a bad feeling about this. A very bad feeling.

Captain Renard walks through the door. Nick sees him pause as he takes in the damage, blood, and finally the lost father staring at the wall. He walks up to Nick, "Situation?"

Nick's answers are quick, strong, completely professional and utterly removed from the feelings of worry and despair that are running rampant inside of him. "From what we can tell it looks like the kid barricaded himself in the room. Possibly had a weapon of some sort and when his attackers came through the door he fought back. We think at least some of the blood is his attackers as well, but we won't know that until lab is back."

Hank chimes in. "So far, what the witnesses are saying that is that they didn't hear anything."

The Captain looks at them both in stupefaction with disbelief in his tone. "Nothing? At all? With the door looking like that?"

Nick nods. "I know sir, but that's what they are saying."

"Scared?" It's a possibility that there actually are witnesses and they are too terrified to report anything. It is something Nick has considered.

Hank, who was the one talking to the uniforms who handled the questioning of the hotel residents nearby dispels that thought. "Possibly, but it seems genuine."

The Captain takes that into consideration. It might be true. They might not have been around when it happened. "Do we know when this happened?"

"Between the hours of 6pm and 12am sir," Nick answers. "That's the last confirmation that anyone has on the whereabouts of the boy and when the Sheriff arrived at his hotel room." It's a big time-frame that the crime could take place in. They need to narrow it down.

Captain Renard nods his head as he takes in the information. "No one else called it in?"

Nick and Hank give the answer together. "No sir." 

Nick adds in information as he catches his Captain up on the case. "Sheriff Stilinski said that when he got to the door he didn't notice anything off until he lifted his hand up to unlock his door and saw the blood. The door swung open as it didn't lock back when the suspects shut it."

The Captain scrutinies the door and then the rest of the room in one quick glance. "So they barge in, subdue and take the kid, then shut the door and walk off down the hall with no witnesses?"

"From what we can gather, that is what happened sir," Hank answers, the confusion evident.

"I find that hard to believe." Captain Renard speaks the statement that they all know is the truth. How could this happen with no one to witness anything? Was it time-frame? Was there really no one around during that time to hear the door being busted in, the loud ruckus as Stiles fought back, and then saw nothing as the kidnappers carried his body out of the room after taking the care to shut the door?

Nick nods his head as Hank speaks. "As do we Captain, but it's all we have to go on."

"Do we have any suspects?" Nick knows what the Captain wants. If they had suspects then there is a chance they can recover the kid and, hopefully, in a timely manner. 

Hank looks at Nick and Nick answers the Captain's question. "There is one possibility but I don't think it's likely." 

"Oh?" The Captain questions.

Nick glances at Hank. It's a long shot but it's still possible. "The suspect in the case that the Sheriff is working on." 

"Ah, yes him." Captain Renard nods his head once. "You don't think it's him because? "The Captain's implicit question lingers as he waits for the answer.

"It doesn't make sense," Nick answers. "Why the visiting Sheriff’s kid? Why not some of the other detectives or officers' who are working the case? Who have worked the case longer? There has been no contact between the suspect and the Sheriff and there has been no facsimile of contact made to any members of the police departments that were working the victims cases. Nothing. So why now? Why Portland?"

"Yes, there is that," Captain Renard concedes. "But it could be that he knows about the case and how close they are to making an arrest."

"They're close?" That's news to Nick. The last he heard about the case they were stuck on the differences in the choice of victims and whether or not there was one murderer or a team working together.

"Yes, we were discussing it earlier today and going over the evidence." The Captain looks towards Stilinski briefly. "The Sheriff has an interesting solution to our suspect profile problem and we were talking to experts about it today. There is an undercover on the suspect, tailing him, and they plan on making the arrest tomorrow when the warrant comes in."

Nick looks at Hank. That would certainly be motive for a kidnapping. "You think the suspect knows?"

Captain Renard pauses for a bit as he thinks about it. "I wouldn't put it out of the realm of possibility. Not on so delicate a matter as this."

Nick notices the pause and pounces. "Do you honestly think that he knows and we should pursue him, Captain?"

Renard looks at the Sheriff and around the room at the damage. "Several attackers?"

"From what we gather, yes," Hank answers as he nods his head once. 

Captain Renard sighs. Nick doesn't know if it is a hopeful or resigned sigh. "The suspect works alone."

Resigned then. Unknown kidnappers makes the situation worse. Even if it seems odd to hope that a sexually deviant serial killer has kidnapped a cop's kid in a bid to put pressure on the investigation. "So we are looking for another connection then?"

The Captain shakes his head slightly and just once. "I wouldn't say that. He might have called in some favors or paid someone."

"But, again. The question becomes why this kid?" This still doesn't make sense to Nick. Even if it was the Sheriff who came to the Captain with the new theory. How could the suspect know that? Is there a mole in the office? But there has been no signs of one previously. Why Stiles? 

"I agree, it doesn't make sense. But we can't take the chance we are wrong here." The Captain reiterates. It may seem a waste of precious resources to focus on or refuse to eliminate the serial killer suspect as the primary possible perpetrator for the kidnapping but they just can't take the chance that they might have been missed something and be wrong. Stiles is depending on them to figure this out.

"Captain?" Hank and Nick ask as they await orders on what to do next. 

Captain Renard looks at Stilinski for a few seconds and then turns to their conversation. "I'll check with the undercover officer and uniforms we have sitting on his place of residence, see if the suspect did anything odd and get a warrant to check if he contacted anyone. Meanwhile you two will see if someone else could be responsible and why they chose the kid."

Hank and Nick answer quick and firm. "Got it."

The Captain looks behind Hank's shoulder to the door and the hallway beyond it. "Do we have any idea how they got out of the hotel or if there is a possibility they are still in the hotel?"

Nick looks to Hank as he answers. "Not yet, we are checking the stairwells, elevators, and the various side entrances. We are also going room by room on this floor and the next one up and down. We plan on going through the rest after that. We're saying that we're checking to see if they heard or saw any disturbances but we are also checking to see if anyone of them might be the kidnappers."

Nick picks up as he brings up the blood trail. "We're also going on the assumption that there might be blood drops in the carpet that we can follow. We're just waiting for the techs to get the spray and lights out to see if there is a trail."

"Estimate?" Captain Renard questions as he looks at his wrist for the time.

Hank answers since he was one who talked to the techs. "They said they will get to it as soon as they are done with the preliminary in here. They sent one of the interns back to get more of the spray for the hall carpet."

"I see." Captain Renard voices.

Nick decides that now is the time to bring up his theory. "Captain, I want to go take a look to see if I can figure out the path they took. The kid was most likely alive when they left considering the blood smear on the door."

The Captain looks at Nick with his full attention. "You think it's his?"

Nick nods. "It looks to be about the same size as his hand print from what we gather."

"And?" Captain Renard queries.

Nick has a slight grin on his face. "I think he did it on purpose."

"Why?" Nick thinks that the Captain knows or suspects he knows and is just waiting for Nick to confirm his own conclusions about Stiles and how he would handle this situation.

"He's a cop's kid. He knows how we think. He knows we are going to look for any kind of evidence and he knows getting the suspects DNA at the scene is important. I think he injured his kidnappers and left us a trail to follow." Nick knows it would be what he would do. What he would tell anyone to do when there is no chance of escape.

Hank cuts in, agreeing with Nick. "It sounds plausible Captain. The kid is smart. He's the type to think ahead and plan out for contingencies."

Nick picks up from that thought and gestures with his hand towards the door and the remains of the barricade. "He barricaded himself in this room. That gives us an idea that he knew they or someone was coming after him." Nick then glances at Stilinski. "The Sheriff also told me that Stiles gets himself into trouble back home, a lot. He just seems to attract it and it's usually due to him being nosy."

Captain Renard looks at Nick as he thinks this through. "So you think he witnessed something and knew he was in trouble? But why not tell his dad?"

Nick shakes his head confused. "I'm not sure. Maybe he was trying to protect him?"

"Protect him from what?" The Captain questions. What could the son be protecting his father from?

Nick looks at Hank. "We don't know. All we know is that they are the only family they have and if he thought his dad couldn't handle it he wouldn't get him involved."

Renard sighs. "Something his dad couldn't handle?" The thought doesn't bode well for the mess that the kid found himself in. "That doesn't sound promising. Do we know if this has something to do with the trouble he gets into at home?"

Nick shakes his head once. "So far, we can't tell. The Sheriff says he will make some calls to see if Stiles' friends know anything." That's the best they can do to check on the information. If other cops start calling Stiles' friends then it might spook them and if they are involved then it might tip off the kidnappers. They can't risk that.

Captain Renard picks up on what Nick is thinking and voices it. "But we can't count on that."

"No, sir," Hank and Nick speak together.

The Captain looks at Stilinski standing still in that same spot looking at the blood on the wall. "I'll take over as lead investigator here and talk to the Sheriff to see if he might be holding something back. We'll need to find out where the kid has been going in the city during the week if he did witness something or if anyone was following him. You two, go track down the blood trail if you can and follow it wherever it goes. Let me know what happens."

"Captain." Nick and Hank speak together as they confirm the order. They turn and walk away. 

Once they reach the hallway Hank asks, "You think the kid is alive?"

"Don't you?" Nick questions Hank back as Hank decides to turn to the right and walk down the hallway.

"A little, yeah." Hank admits. "But realistically, it doesn't look good if he is or isn't. Some of this blood has to be his and we don't know what type of injury he has."

"I know," Nick concedes. It's a thought that has been bouncing in the back of his mind. "But I have this feeling."

"Oh." Hank looks at Nick waiting for him to give him details.

"He's still alive. They want something from him," Nick admits.

"So not just a nosy witness?" Hank asks Nick in a pseudo statement.

"Maybe, maybe not." Nick isn't too sure himself. Stiles seems the type to wind up in trouble, but has enough brains to know how to get himself out of it. Probably by blabbing his mouth and confusing those around him into letting him go. But this? This is an unknown. So many things don't make sense here, the only possible reason they could have to grab Stiles is because they want something from him or people who know him.

"Then what do they want from him?" Hank asks bringing voice to Nick's own thoughts.

"I don't know." After those final words from Nick the conversation drops and they continue the walk in silence looking at the walls and floor for drops of blood. 

Several minutes pass and they reach a bend in the hallway. So far as they can see there is no deviation to show that they stopped or went into a room, but that doesn't mean they didn't. Nick and Hank glance at each other and decide to follow the hallway's path. "Nick, does that look a little more red than the carpet's color?"

Nick looks at where Hank is pointing. "It does seem a little more darker then the rest."

"You think it's blood?" Hank inquires.

"It could be," Nick concurs. "What do you think?"

"I think we should follow this and see if we run into any more dark red spots on the carpet." Hank states as he continues looking at the red spot in the carpet. He then starts to continue the inspection of the rest of the carpet, walking slowly down the hallway after placing a little piece of blue tape by the red splot.

"Agreed. I'll let the Captain know that we may have found something." Nick calls the Captain. "Captain, we're at the bend in the hallway near room 420 we think we may have found a drop of blood. Hank and I are going to follow it." 

Captain Renard's voice comes in clear and calm over the phone with no hint of any emotion. "I'll send some people there to test the drop. Let me know if you find anymore."

"Understood," Nick states as he ends the call.

Nick turns and walks up to Hank a few doors down from the possible blood spot. "Captain is sending some techs to look at the spot. He wants us to continue on and keep him updated."

Hank points ahead towards the end of the hallway. "Nick, I think there is a stairwell in this direction if I recall correctly from the emergency exit layout plaque they had on the wall a few doors back."

Nick looks towards where Hank is pointing and thinks back to the plaque that Hank is talking about. "So we have the possible exit they took."

"Maybe," Hank answers uncertain as they all are about everything to do with this case. Too many questions and not near enough answers. All they have thus far are maybes on everything to do with it.

"Let's continue checking the carpet and see where it leads us." Nick suggests as they continue the inspection.

A few doors from there they spot more suspicious blood drops this time in successive order. Nick calls in to the Captain to update him and they continue on. When they reach room 410 they realize that Hank is right and they are near a stairwell. Nick checks it out while Hank calls in to the Captain. The moment that Nick opens the stairwell door he knows that this is the one they took. The blood drops are more easily seen on the concrete floor compared to the red carpet and they lead down. Nick lets Hank know and he walks slowly down the steps with his gun in his hand. He makes sure that each step he takes is as quiet as he can possibly make it. He has no idea what is waiting for him at the end of the stairs and he has to be ready for anything.

Hank catches up to him shortly and they walk slowly as silent as they can be down the steps. They reach the third floor and there is a slight smear of blood on the wall next to the railing. Nick can't be sure but he thinks the smear is fingerprints. Nick nods his head to it to indicate to Hank the blood smear and Hank acknowledges it with a nod of his head, the look on his face getting grim.

They continue down the stairs following the drops of blood all the way down to the first floor and go back into a hallway with red carpet. They don't see anyone near them and Hank radios the Captain to let him know what they found while Nick tries to figure out which direction they went. 

"Which direction?" Hank queries as he walks up to Nick who is squatting looking at the carpet. Both of them have their guns out and are looking about but no one is around, no sounds can be heard, and the red carpet makes it difficult to see the blood drops.

"I'm not sure. It's hard to tell." Nick states as he looks at the red trying to find the bright spots that let him know where they went. "I think they ran for it once they reached here because I can't find any immediate blood spots."

Hank nods. It makes sense. "We're near an exit. Think we should go into that direction?"

"Would be my best guess if I was looking for a quick exit." So they turn left and head in that direction, following the hallway.

The walk to the side exit is slow as they look for signs of blood and keep their ears peeled for any sign of disturbance. Most likely the suspects left but that could be what they want them to think while they plan another escape route.

After several rooms they finally find a spot of blood. It looks as if they are going in the right direction. Then after a few more rooms they see more drops of blood. The best sign that they are going in the right direction is the dark red hand-print on the wall next to the exit door. Unlike the others there is practically no smears in it. Nick can see the fingerprints of the hand that made it. If he had to take a guess he would say that it was Stiles'.

Hank radios the Captain with the new development and Nick opens the door. There is no alarm as it is a common exit for the hotel guests. It's dark out here with only a few lights above the door, barely enough to see anything with. The streetlight across the hotel is blinking on and off like it has a short. There doesn't seem to be anyone in the vicinity. There are a few vehicles parked nearby but that's it. Overall, it's a very dark, quiet, and spooky atmosphere. The perfect place to park a vehicle to idle while a crew goes in and kidnaps someone. 

A cold pit of ice drops into Nick's stomach as reality sets in. 

Turning Nick sees Hank meet his eyes and they both look back at the street in front of them.

This is where their trail is going to get cold. They have no idea what vehicle was waiting. They could have already switched it out for another one by now. There doesn't seem to be any surveillance cameras in the area or any possible witnesses either. 

With most kidnappings the one kidnapped is usually used as leverage for the kidnappers to get what they wanted from those who would want the kidnappee back, typically money. Here, though, it seems what they wanted was Stiles and with no ransom note or phone call the chances of Stiles coming back home to his dad unharmed or at all has considerably dropped. 

It wasn't long after Hank contacted the Captain about the confirmation that the kidnappers left the hotel that Nick thought about how odd things were about it. Why didn't anyone see anything? Hear anything? How could the door be that bashed in with no one realizing that anything was happening? It would take Nick or Hank at least 10 minutes to bash in that door even more if you consider the furniture that Stiles put up against the door to barricade it. And yet, not only was the door smashed in quickly but the barricade was pushed far away from the door. No human could do that. _No human..._ And with that a new fear began to sprout in Nick. Because if it wasn't humans who did this then it was Wesen and if it was Wesen he had no idea why they would pick Stiles to kidnap. _A Wesen kidnapping ring? It could be possible. Monroe will know._

Nick wanted to contact Monroe right away to talk to him about Stiles and the kidnappers possibly being Wesen, but the Captain requested him and Hank back to the station. 

On the drive to the station Nick tried to call Monroe, it went to voice mail. "Monroe, this is Nick. I need to talk to you right away. Contact me as soon as possible."

When Nick arrived at the station he noticed that everyone – from desk clerks, interns, undercover and uniformed officers, to detectives – were in the room.

Nick had an idea of what was about to happen and knew that some others knew what was going on as well, but most of the men and women in the room were called up in the middle of the night for this assignment and this was the moment that they were going to be told what happened and what their assignment is to be.

For the moment everyone was just milling around gossiping and trying to find out what was going on, why they were called up, and where the Captain was.

One thing that Nick noticed as he waited for the Captain to come out for his speech was that there was no press, journalists, or known local bloggers in the room. For investigation updates it's not that unusual, but Nick also noticed that when he came up to the building that there was no media vans outside the building or media personnel in the building. 

Captain Renard came out of his office and walked up to the front of the room. His voice was strong and carried through the room, "I know that some of you have been here since the moment the call came in while the rest of you were on your night off or possibly woken up with only a few hours sleep before your shift starts. You all must be wondering why you are here. Tonight one of our own's son was taken from the room he was staying in by an unknown and violent group. We do not know if this has to do with a current investigation taking place led by the young man's father or if he attracted the attention of his kidnappers by witnessing something."

Nick noticed how quiet the room became when the heard the words, 'one of our own's son was taken' and became even quieter at, 'by an unknown and violent group.' A quick look around the room showed the serious and stark faces of everyone listening to the Captain speak. _Too close, much too close._

The Captain continued, "This is what we do know. Stiles Stilinski aged 16 – only child to Sheriff Stilinski of Beacon Hills Sheriff Department – was staying at _The Linda_ in room 447 for the past 5 days while his father was working on a shared case with a couple of our detectives. He often left the hotel and went to a local cafe called _Dingo Baby_ and to the local library. He returned to the hotel at a quarter to six according to his room's key card. From there what we know is that sometime between that and 12:14am when his father arrived to the hotel, Stilinski was taken, violently, from the room."

There was a little stir in the room as the men and women wanted to know how someone could be taken violently from a hotel room and no one report it for hours. Surely someone heard something, right? Captain Renard was undeterred by the unasked questions stirring in the minds of his people and continued, "As of now, there have been no witnesses who have come forward having seen or heard anything. We do not know if this is genuine or if they were threatened or intimidated by the attackers. What we do know is that between these hours several people, most likely male, stormed the room that Stilinski was in and forcibly dragged him out. In the ensuing fight there was blood split. It is our assumption that Stilinski – for whatever purpose, knew that people were coming for him as he barricaded himself in the hotel room – was armed and fought back and injured his attackers. Blood samples were taken and tests are being done to see if we can possibly ID the attackers. At this point, however, we cannot count on that as the least time consuming tests will take hours and we need to move quickly. From what we gathered, this is a kidnapping but there has been no ransom sent. That means that Stilinski was either their primary target or they took him to get information. At this point it is hard to say."

Out of the corner of his eye Nick noticed a few officers getting anxious. Captain Renard's eyes flicked to them and then back to the room, "We believe this to be a planned operation. We are not counting on a ransom coming anytime soon and thus we find ourselves in a stuck position of having a violent kidnapping crew with their hostage and having no idea who they are, what they want, why they took Stilinski–" It was at this point that a catch popped up in the Captain's voice as he spoke the next words, "nor if Stilinski is currently alive now or can be retrieved alive." 

The room went silent and still like a graveyard with no one speaking or moving. The realization that they may not in fact be working a kidnapping case but a kidnapping and murder case of a cop's kid hit everyone hard. All the evidence they have gathered won't help them find the kidnappers and save Stiles – life isn't like the CSI TV shows, the tests take time, too much time to be worth anything when every minute counts – but they will be used to prosecute the kidnapper for their crimes, if they are able to apprehend them.

The quiet only lasted a minute or so but it felt much longer before their Captain's steady and strong voice filled the room once more, "I've been in touch with the FBI and they will be arriving shortly to help us out. In the meantime, I will be leading the investigation. Needless to say, we will go radio silent on this. We do not want this information to get out to the media since we don't know how the kidnappers will react. We need to canvas the area in the long-shot that someone saw several men dragging a teenaged boy into a vehicle and driving off. In the interim, I want to know what Stilinski was doing during the past five days. Where did he go besides the cafe and the library? Who did he talk to? What did he do while there? What did he eat and drink? Did he take the same path everyday? Was he being followed? We need to know everything we can in order to find this kid. Dismissed."

After Captain Renard dismissed everyone, Nick noticed that he was looking at him in an expectant manner and walked up to him awaiting a debriefing and new orders. The Captain turned and walked back to his office and Nick followed him.

Nick walks in nodding at Hank already standing in front of the Captain's desk and takes his place near to him. Captain Renard walks around to his desk and sits down. "Do we have any updates?" 

Nick looked towards Hank and watched him shake his head. He thought about Stiles and his hometown and decided to ask the question that has been on his mind."Have we out ruled that this has something to do with Stiles and his tendency to get into trouble in Beacon Hills?"

Captain Renard shook his head. "Sheriff Stilinski is trying to get a hold of Stiles' friends. He hasn't told them what happened but asked if Stiles has been getting into more trouble lately than he usually has. According to him they denied it, but he's checking up with his deputies. So far, though, he doesn't believe this has anything to do with Beacon Hills. He thinks that Stiles saw something and gained attention from people he shouldn't have. It seems to happen quite often back home."

Hank utters a low mummer then asks, "Are we sure this isn't tied to the case his father was working on?"

"I checked in with the uniforms I had placed outside the suspect's home and the undercover who was tailing him, the suspect has been at home the whole time. The warrant is still in the process of getting approved. I do not expect it not to take much longer since there is a possible kidnapping incident that might have something to do with it. However, my instinct tells me this has nothing to do with it."

Nick sighs. "So we have a noisy, inquisitive, hyperactive teenager walking around several blocks in Portland around The Linda for the past five days and he somehow sees something and attracts someone's attention who then decides to kidnap the teenager. For what? To keep him quiet? Give them something?"

The Captain places his head on his steepled hands. It's his best guess as well and he has no idea who, what, where, or how. Nor how all of this ties into Stilinski's son.

Nick thinks back to the room and how fast the kidnapping went down. "Doesn't the break in at the hotel seem a little too professional for something like that?" 

Captain Renard and Hank turn to look at Nick, wondering where he was going with this. "What do you mean?"

Nick sighs trying to find the words to explain what he thinks might have happened. "Are we sure that he witnessed anything at all? That it's not about something else?"

Captain Renard sits back in his chair and gives Nick the 'go on' gesture wanting to know more about what Nick was thinking. "Are we sure he didn't just gain the attention of some trafficking crew?" 

"Human trafficking?" Hank asks a little taken back by the theory.

Nick nods. "Yeah, I mean." Nick pauses thinking of which words to use to express his thoughts. "He fits a type doesn't he? A twink, right?"

Hank mouths the words, 'twink.' It wasn't something he thought about at first from meeting him. Yet, thinking back on it he does seem to fit the type. Hank nods his head, "Yeah, I think he does."

Captain Renard leans forward once more and clasps his hands together underneath his jaw, thinking. "So what you are saying is that while walking around Portland he might have gained the attention of some trafficking recruiters? How?"

Nick shrugs. "For all we know he bumped into one of them on the street and complimented them on their eyes, like he did you sir." Nick still has a slight grin at that memory. It was one of the most priceless and incredible moments in his life. The look on everyone's face but especially that of his Captain. "It doesn't take much to gain their attention, you just have to look a certain way and be vulnerable to being snatched."

The Captain's eye twitched at the reminder of the compliment that Stiles paid him when they first met. Nick couldn't tell if it was aggravation at the reminder of the embarrassing moment or something else. He nodded his head though in agreement with Nick. "It is not outside the realm of possibility, is it?"

"No sir," Nick agreed. "Millions of people go missing every year and tens of thousands of them wind up in traffickers hands."

"So, we're saying that while on one of his jaunts to the café or library he ran into a recruiter and gained their attention? So then what, they just followed him back to the hotel and snatched him?" Hank questioned Nick.

"It sounds plausible, right?" Nick reiterated.

"It does," Hank agreed. "But how did he know they were coming after him? Remember he barricaded the door?"

The Captain looked at Nick as he expected an answer. It was his theory after all. "The kid is smart. You saw it as well Hank. He's aware of things and his dad's a Sheriff. I'm sure he taught him how to recognize if you're being followed."

"Be that as it may," Captain Renard began, "why not contact his father?"

Nick shrugged. He didn't know. Why wouldn't the kid contact his father about traffickers or creepy people following him? Unless, _did he know they were Wesen? Or did he just sense there was something off about them?_ "I don't know, but it's a theory worth perusing don't you agree? After all, I doubt they meant to take a cop's kid. Which means that if they find out then..."

"...it won't end well for the kid," Hank continued, finishing Nick's thought.

"No it won't," the Captain agreed. "Do you have any sources that you can check out this theory on?"

Thinking of Monroe and the possibility that this is tied to Wesen Nick replied, "I think so."

"And?" The Captain queried.

Nick thinks back quickly on how to answer this without bringing in the possible supernatural aspect of the case. "It's not a definite source but I think they might have an idea of who to contact to find out if there was something like that going on in Portland. I tried to contact them earlier, but they haven't returned my call yet. I was planning on dropping by their place to talk to them."

Captain Renard then looked towards Hank. "I have a guy who might work with some people who know about this sort of thing. He should be able to find out something as well."

The Captain looks back out at the squad room, thinking, and then glances back at the two detectives before him. Nick notices a strange look in his eye as he looks at him. "Check out those leads and get back to me."

Nick and Hank nodded their heads and then walked out the door. 

The room was buzzing as cops moved to and fro carrying coffee, paperwork, talking to other personnel, and on the phone as they chased down leads. Hank and Nick walked to their desks, Nick gathered his things, nodded his goodbye to Hank as he sat down to call his source, and Nick walked out of the room. 

With his cellphone in his hand he tried once more to call Monroe and was again sent to voicemail. Resigning himself to dropping by Monroe's Nick got in his vehicle and drove off.

It was in the middle of the night and not quite the early morning hours yet, but it was still dark and traffic was minimum as Nick arrived to Monroe's less than thirty minutes later. He took a deep breath trying to push his worry about Stiles away, _poor kid_ , and got out of his vehicle and knocked on Monroe's door. It was several minutes before Monroe opened the door.

"Nick what are you doing here? It's in the middle of the night in case you didn't know." Monroe spoke in a terse manner as he opened the door.

"I know," Nick answers. "I tried calling you a couple of times. I need your help." 

"When do you ever not need my help?" Monroe snaps back. "What is it?" He asks in a terse manner. Knows it probably has something to do with him constantly questioning him about Grimm related things and bugging him at all hours of day and night. He's still upset about the Pilates thing.

Nick takes a breath and sighs out his answer. "A kidnapping of a cop's kid by Wesen, I think."

The color on Monroe's face drastically paled. "Jesus."

Nick nods and looks back up at Monroe, looking him in the eye. "Which is why I need your help."

"Why do you think it was Wesen?" Monroe inquires as he opens the door and allows Nick inside.

Nick practically collapses on Monroe's couch and starts the long tale about everything that he knew on the case while Monroe paces in front of him. He told him how there was no witnesses or none who would come forward, how fast it seemed that the door was busted down and how the furniture barricade that Stiles built was knocked back considerably from the door as if a great amount of force was applied that seemed to be more than a normal human was capable of. 

"Barricade?" Monroe stops in his pacing for a moment and asks a little confused, "You think this kid knew he was being targeted?"

"Yeah," Nick concurs. "That's the theory we have."

Monroe gestures with his hands as he asks the question that everyone has been asking. "But why not inform his dad, the Sheriff, or the police that he was being targeted?" 

Nick runs his hand through his hair, Monroe starts pacing again, "We don't know. We think maybe he was scared of his dad getting involved."

"But why would he be scared of his being involved?" Monroe asks as he stops in his pacing once more. Why, indeed. Why did Stiles think his dad and the police couldn't handle it?

Nick shakes his head. "We don't know." Running his hand through his hair once more Nick answers, "We can only speculate that it's because of issues going on in Beacon Hills with him being in trouble a lot and that they are the only family they have."

"Only family?" Nick hears the confusion in the question. What did Nick mean by 'only family?'

Nick looks up at Monroe, looking him in the eye as Monroe finally sits down in the chair. "Mom's deceased, several years now and there is no other living relative for either of them."

"Damn." Monroe shakes his head. "So the kid didn't contact anyone for help because of that? It doesn't make sense."

"I know." It's something that Nick has been running through his mind over and over. So many things don't make sense and the least of which is the strange behavior Stiles took after knowing he was in danger. "I'm thinking there's something more going on but I'm not sure what."

"Nick?" Monroe queries, knowing that there must be more that Nick isn't telling him.

"The kid, Stiles, there's something about him." Nick finally admits.

"What do you mean?" Monroe asks in confusion. 

Nick is uncomfortable talking about this. He still doesn't know what happened, but something did and it could be related to the kidnapping and if so he has to talk about it because it could help Stiles. _Stiles_. There is something about that kid. Something within Nick that makes him want to protect him and it goes beyond what he usually feels as a cop being protective of someone. Something deeper that he can't explain that is telling him he _has_ to protect Stiles. "I'm not sure how to explain it."

Nick pauses for a long time and he can see Monroe start to get anxious. "When we met. There was this instant feeling of..." Nick tries to find the words. Friendship? Commadarie? Protectiveness? 

"Of...?" Monroe queries to try to coax the words out of Nick.

"Of... of something." Nick tried but still couldn't think of the way to properly express what he felt, feels, about Stiles. If he could put a word to it, it would be familial but that doesn't make sense. Why would he feel something like that about a kid who he met five days ago? "I'm not sure how to say it. There's something about him that makes me feel protective about him. Not just as a cop, but like he's... he's family?"

"Family?" Monroe repeats in confusion. As far as Monroe knows Nick has no family, not anymore.

Nick nods. "There was this moment when we met and it wasn't just the bantering that we got into with Hank. When he shook my hand, there was feeling that just...it felt like it encased me."

"Encased you?" Monroe asks in a little high pitched voice. "Nick you're not making sense. What the hell are you talking about?"

"I told you, I don't know." Nick blurts in an angry tone. He knows he's not making sense. He doesn't need someone else to point that out to him. He needs answers not the same questions he's been asking himself. "I didn't even realize it was something until later."

"Was some _thing_?" Monroe questions putting emphasis on the word in a different pitch. What _thing_?

"It's just..." Nick begins but then stops. He can't quite find the words so he decides to just blurt it all out. “The moment the moment we shook hands, there was this feeling it was like peace but not quite... Maybe protective as well?" Nick questions himself wondering what kind of feeling it really was. "I'm not sure. I can't find the words to the explain it. All I know is that it centered around Stiles. That Stiles was the cause of it. Like we had a bond between us."

"Bond?!" Nick looks up at Monroe at the strange sound that came out of his mouth as he spoke the word. It was as if he was frightened. "Wait, are you trying to say that you feel bonded to this kid, this Stiles?"

Nick looks at Monroe but he's not really seeing him. He's thinking back to that day nearly a week ago when they first met. "I think so."

Monroe's face gets a little more pale and Nick starts to feel that he might not like what Monroe is going to say next. "...are you saying he might be a Grimm?"

Nick is shocked. He didn't expect that. Why would he think the kid, Stiles, might be a Grimm? But...why does it also feel like it's true? "I don't know, maybe?"

Nick looks at Monroe. "Would there be a bond or feeling like that between Grimms? What about if one is an adult Grimm and the other is a child or teenager?" Nick knows practically nothing about Grimms. From everything that Monroe has said he has the conclusion that this is hereditary and passed on down through a familial line so that means there has to be something in the line, in the blood, that connects them all, right?

"I...I don't know Nick," Monroe states as he shrugs his shoulders in confusion and frustration. "All we know about Grimms are the bad things, that they hunt us, take our heads, and the stories our parents tell us."

Nick knows that. Knows that Monroe isn't his Yoda and doesn't have all the answers that he needs, but he was still hoping that Monroe might have some idea. "So this might be something normal? Something like a mentor bond?" Nick is older than Stiles. It could be something like a Jedi Master and a Padawan bond, right?

Monroe shrugs his shoulders. "Your guess is as good as mine."

Nick thinks back on his knowledge about Star Wars mythology and theories on magic and bonds from fantasy stories he's read and movies he's watched. "Can it be used to find Stiles?"

Monroe looks at him in an assessing way. "When you first met and touched hands did you feel a sense of direction of where he was? A kind of sonar or radar feeling that you were near him?"

Nick tries to think back on that day and the feeling that he had but it's all confusing because he wasn't paying attention, it just didn't feel real to him and he thought it was all in his head. "Yes, no, maybe? Sorry Monroe, but I just wasn't...I didn't think it was real and I didn't pay attention to it."

Monroe looks at Nick in a long measuring glance. "Why do you believe it now?"

Nick is taken back by the question. Why does he believe it now? Why is he so sure that Wesen have Stiles? What is driving him? _I don't know._

Nick looks to Monroe, utterly lost. "I don't know. It's just this gut feeling that I have. Similar to when I'm on a case and I know something about it is wrong, but that I just don't have any idea what or why."

Monroe nods, "Yeah, I can understand that. Just something instinctual telling you something and you are trying to listen but the voice is too far away to make out anything."

"Yeah," Nick professes. "It's like that."

Monroe looks at his hands, thinking, then he looks up and grins at Nick. "So where do we go now Grimm-sensei?"

"Grimm-sensei?" Nick asks bewildered at the new nickname.

"Well you are the teacher to mini Grimm aren't you?" Monroe questions Nick in a teasing way.

"Teacher?" Nicks repeats still in a bit of a shock at the responsibility of mentoring the kid, Stiles, a Grimm-in-training.

Monroe nods with a grin, "Teacher." Then he looks up at Nick who is looking confused and befuddled and out of sorts and speaks in a serious manner. "If you are right and he is a baby Grimm then don't you have a duty to teach him what you know to protect him and Wesen from overreaction?"

"I guess so." Nick admits slowly still unsure about everything and not really wanting the responsibility in the first place.

"Nick," Monroe begins, "if you don't do it then he will either have to learn on the ropes like you are or someone else – someone we don't know who they are or what their motivations may be – will teach him for you."

Nick looks at Monroe as the thought of Stiles being trained by a Grimm like the ones in Monroe's stories enters his mind. He doesn't think Stiles could handle it. Could he be turned into a hardened killer like his aunt was from what Monroe tells him? "When you put it that way."

"Exactly." Monroe states. 

"But isn't this all conjecture at this point?" Nick asks as he tries to get the heart of the matter, that they really don't know what is going on.

"It's best to have an idea of what you may be facing in the future." And if that doesn't give Nick bad feelings about the situation.

Nick sighs feeling all twisted up inside as everything he thought he knew was turned upside down again. He didn't know if he could properly teach the kid. Hell Nick wasn't sure he, himself, was being taught at all. Everything he knew was just what he learned off the cuff, through Monroe, or his aunt's books. The thought of Stiles having to go through what he has and all because he didn't want to take the responsibility of looking after him was difficult to swallow. He doesn't even know when all the hypotheticals in this case about Stiles possibly being a Grimm went to definites but something inside of him makes him feel like it's right and true.

"How are we going to find him?" Nick wonders out loud, as he goes back to the topic at hand of finding the missing kid and saving him from his kidnappers.

Monroe is quiet for several seconds and then hesitantly speaks. "If it was Wesen and they think he's a baby Grimm then there are ways to find him." 

"Ways?" Nick queries with confusion, concern, and wariness.

"You don't want to know. Trust me." Monroe states with a strong conviction that makes Nick even more concerned about Stiles. "Listen, just go back to checking the other leads in the case and I'll check on the Wesen side of things. If I hear anything I'll let you know. Okay?"

"Yeah. I got it." Nick gets up and walks to the door. He pauses, turns back into the room, "Monroe..." He can't finish the thought. He doesn't know what to say or think. All this Grimm stuff has always made him feel that he's beyond his depth. 

Monroe turned when he heard his name. Nick shakes his head and walks out the door. "...Never mind."

Nicks walks off the porch, gets back in his vehicle, and drives off back to the station thinking about everything. Nothing has really made any sense lately, not since Aunt Marie died.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while. I blame school. Just the one beta again, my lovely Anna. I decided to split this and chapter 11 up into two chapters. I probably should have done the same for chapter 9. But I decided to do this not for the length of the chapter but because of the content in chapter 11. This way people can find out what Stiles did without having to read what they in turn did to him.

If Stiles had to think about how all of this could possibly get any worse he had absolutely no suggestions. From Stiles' pov this very situation seemed to the FUBAR of all FUBAR incidents and should probably find itself listed in the dictionary as the absolute worst that a FUBAR situation could possibly devolve into and that's only if anyone bothers to actually believe half of what the definition would describe. 

Werewolves, hunters, wolfsbane, lizard creatures and whatever the hell this new supernatural creature species or subgroup genus happens to be should belong to the realm of fantasy and dragons and make believe. Not reality. Not _Stiles'_ reality! Months ago he was just a normal teenager dealing with normal teenage angsty stuff that encompassed everything he did; hanging out with Scott, being turned down by his Goddess Lydia, being harassed by Jackson (again), eying up Danny, trying to get his dad to eat healthier, deal with Harris being a dick, and so forth.

Normal first world teenage privilege angsty drama! That was his life and then Peter has to fucking wake up from his coma more insane than batshit crazy Michele Bachmann and out for blood thirsty revenge, which granted was richly deserved but then he has the fucking brilliant idea to _bite_ Scott. Which drags Stiles into their world because there's no fucking way he's letting his bff deal with this existential supernatural-monsters-are-real slaughterfest without him. So, now it's _Stiles'_ reality and instead of being normal and taking a trip down Denial Lane off the Denial River in Denial Province Stiles is going to accept this completely fucked up FUBAR supernatural situation and _deal_ with this shit. Like a Boss!

So, status check. What should Stiles be doing at this very second? Sitting here in his non-barricaded ( _need to fix that_ ) hotel room in fucking Portland waiting for Derek to drive all the way from Beacon Hills to come rescue his ass from sort of supernatural creature he's never even heard of before. 

Stiles _hates_ being the damsel in distress all the time. Sometimes, it just fucking sucks to be a normal human. Well, normal in the non-supernatural strength human category. Werewolves are still human in Stiles' book. Just, a suped up version of human. Perhaps the next evolutionary strand of humanity? Ones that can actually survive space travel? 

_I wonder if NASA should start to recruit werewolves? I wonder what their slogan would be? Come be humanity's greatest achievement and help us colonize space? But would being closer to the moon affect them in a very bad losing control ways or is it only on Earth that the moon becomes a supernatural conduit? Because, honestly? What the fuck is up with that shit? The moon just reflects the sun's rays it shouldn't be able to cause such irrationality in people and werewolves just because it's full. Gravity? Tidal waves? Magic? Has anyone done any studies on that? What about–_

Stiles' thought is cut off as he hears footsteps walking down the hallway. He just got off the phone with Derek five fucking minutes ago! _It's too soon! Derek can't get here yet! I haven't even set up traps or made improvised weapons yet!_

Stiles crouches down from where he was sitting and puts his ear to the floor. He tries to tell if the footsteps are coming closer to his door or going farther away. He tries to calm his heart from the fast jackrabbit pacing it had in his terror from first hearing the foot steps. He covers his mouth and tries to slow his breathing, anything he can think of to try to sound like a normal person in a normal hotel and not someone expecting a supernatural SWAT unit to come busting in and take him. _Would they be covered in armor like a SWAT unit or just in regular clothes? So would it be more like a team of evil John McClanes busting down the door and dragging me out?_

Stiles decided to put his morbid thoughts away and get to work making sure that when they came for him, if they came before Derek, that he would make them earn taking him. Hopefully they wanted to take him. It would really suck to put all this preparation to work and then they just kill him as an afterthought. _God, what if they kill me and dad finds me? Jesus, let them kidnap me. Oh god, just please don't let my dad find me like that. It will_ kill _him if he does._ It was centerpiece capstone that in _this_ situation the best thing he could hope for was them kidnapping him. _The FUBAR of all FUBAR situations!_

It had been an hour since he called Scott out of desperation and got Derek instead. Derek, who somehow knew exactly what he was facing but didn't deem it wise for Stiles to know. _Sourwolf bastard! Of course I should know! It has to do with me...right?_ The only reasonable explanation that Stiles could think of was that Derek knew it wouldn't help the situation and wasn't that a thought Stiles wanted to permeate around in his brain. _What type of creatures are they? Why was Derek so panicky?_

So, here Stiles was, sitting on the floor of his hotel room after locking the door; putting a chair underneath the door knob; sticking plastic utensils in the crack of the door space by the lock and at the top of the door; and moving the majority of the furniture against the door to create a barricade. Majority because one of the tables was sacrificed to make weapons. Stiles had unscrewed the legs from the table top to fashion a weapon. Stiles would have moved the beds and night tables but those fuckers were bolted down and he couldn't move them without tools. 

Stiles thought about opening the windows as a last chance escape route, but these windows don't open and it's still a four story fall onto concrete below him. He has half a plan to try to have one of the bad guys/girls/creatures go through it. But the window is solidly made and he has a funny feeling that they would just bounce off of it like a wall. 

Earlier, Stiles had dug through his backpack, his suitcase, and his dad's bags looking for anything that could be a weapon. He grabbed some pens and pencils. It would be tricky to make them into a weapon but if he had enough force he could use them to stab someone. But the crème de la crème was the art exacto knife he found. He's not sure when it got into his bag but he's lucky and so very happy he found it. In fact, he gave it a special 'Eureka! Celebration Dance' the moment he saw it. Its in his back pocket at the moment. A typical Harry Potter move but he doesn't have to worry about it somehow exploding his arse if he sits down on it. Just a deep cut. Which is still a pain in the ass if there ever was a better example of it but loads better than Harry's risk for a foul up. _Geek thy be._

Yet, all this preparation hasn't quelled the feeling in his chest that he's outgunned, outmanned, and outmatched. Stiles knows, deep inside, that this is an all or nothing situation he's in and with these creatures and their superhuman strength and abilities it is all nothing and will mean nothing to those coming for him. 

Stiles has no idea how strong they are but if they're anything like werewolves then from the moment they start to bust down the door to when they come in will probably be at the most long-shot five minutes. If Stiles had to guess, it would be three minutes, but that's only if the lock holds up. This place isn't exactly a flea bag motel but it's not the Ritz either so the moulding probably won't hold very long. _Where's a panic room when you need one?_

If Stiles was the type to suffer from PTS – freaking miracle he's lasted this long dealing with supernatural crap and still not have PTS – this would be the moment when he'd be flashing back to when the Alpha was hunting them through the school. Stiles really wants his molotov cocktail in his hands. Its a very useful weapon and Stiles is sure it would work on these creatures just as effective as it would work on alpha werewolves. 

Stiles' cellphone is near him on the floor as he sits behind his dad's bed next to the foot of it which is closest to the window. No calls, no texts, and the time is going slow. It's a horrible waiting game. He knows it'll take Derek several hours to get here from Beacon Hills and that's with breaking every single speeding law by at least 15 mph. There's nothing to do but wait and hope that they won't come. It's a futile hope. Stiles feels the truth deep inside. They are coming tonight. Soon.

Stiles doesn't know why he knows but he knows. Derek won't make it in time. Strangely, Stiles isn't scared. He's terrified, but it's a calm terror, one he can still think in. He's calm in a way he's never been before as he waits for them to come.

Stiles wants to check the clock on his phone but he's also worried that he will see how slow time is going and become more focused on that then on hearing them coming for him. So, instead, he focuses on breathing, on making sure his weapons are near his hands, and deep breaths to calm the panic that keeps trying to rise. He has to keep reminding himself to breathe because he's terrified of the situation, the creatures coming for him, and the fact that he can't win against them and he's preparing for the moment he has to fight back against them.

So he sits in a half crossed leg position on the floor with one knee resting on the ground the other up in preparation of being able to move quickly from his position. Stiles focuses on breathing, in and out, deep and long, over and over and keeping the calm in his mind as he plans for what's to come.

He keeps running different scenarios in his head. Like an episode of Worse Case Scenario and how he can prevent that from happening. In that moment, Stiles understands girls in a way he never thought he would before. He remembers when he was a young boy and his mom told him about how when she was alone she would always run scenarios in her head of what could happen to her and how she could get away from it. She said it was something she picked up from self-defense courses and was the reason why when she left her jacket and his dad came running up to her to return it that she punched first and asked questions later. The way she was laughing as she told the story to Stiles belied the real fear she had in those few seconds of hearing running footsteps behind her and then seeing a cop in a full uniform laid out on the ground seconds later.

Stiles imagines that the calm in his head is what she felt then, a certainty that she knew what to do when the situation presented itself. She could defend herself and she wouldn't be afraid to do so. Strange, how in this supernatural life and death situation that Stiles finds himself in while being in another state that he feels the closest to his mother than he has in years. 

The moment he gets home – because there is no acceptance of the possibility that he won't make it out of this situation and not go home – he's going to get those self-defense lessons from Allison that he's been putting off of asking about. She's a hunter and a badass, she can teach him. Screw male pride from having to ask a girl for help and worry about embarrassing himself at how pathetic he is, he _needs_ to be able to fight back. He _needs_ to be able to defend himself and stop having to be rescued all the fucking time like a stereotypical Disney 'heroine'.

A sound attracts Stiles attention from his self-deprecation monologue. Since his phone call to Derek there has been several instances in which Stiles has heard footsteps walk past his door in the hallway. This time, though, Stiles senses something off. Feels something from inside him _scream_ at him to prepare to fight. So he listens to it. He moves out of his sitting position to that of kneeling on one knee as if he's about to be knighted. Near his hands are two legs from the table he cannibalized for his weapons and he grips them tightly with his head bowed, waiting. The exacto knife is in his back jeans pocket sticking out just enough so that he can quickly grab it without worrying about it falling out and he is calm, a hyper sense of awareness and patience. 

Stiles lets out a deep breath and closes his eyes listening to the footsteps outside the door. From the sound of the footsteps it's a group of people, there are no words being passed between them, and they are walking _towards_ his door. He can hear them pausing in front of his door. There is a slight sound of disturbance as an object of some sort is pulled out of something. _A tool? For what purpose? What are they doing?_

Then Stiles hears the lock on the door disengage. _What the fuck?! They have a key?! Goddamnit, there goes my three minutes!_ Somehow the bastards not only have an electronic key to his door but they were able to unlock the turn lock on the door as well. He hears one of them turn the doorknob and push slightly against the door.

Stiles takes a calming breath and waits for them to break the barricade that he built. He won't open his eyes until they're in the room. The lights are off and he is surrounded in darkness, he will be blinded if he opens his eyes as they open the door because of the light from the hallway. Best to wait.

It comes faster than he thought it might – just a few slight pushes, one after the other, to gauge the size and strength of the barricade and then one ample solid thrust – and the entire barricade comes tumbling down. _Supernatural strength? Check._

Stiles can feel his heart start to beat faster as it floods with hormones and chemicals to thrust him into the fight/flight mode that your body responds to when faced with a threat, but he tries to calm it down. He's afraid they will hear it and realize where he's hiding in the room and not mistake him for being a neighbor.

There's a strange deafening silence around him as Stiles focuses on hearing them take the first steps into the room and _sniff_. Stiles knows they're searching for him and he has to keep his heart-rate from racing in order to avoid detection for the longest he can in order to muster a suitable defense that'll leave enough evidence for him to be found by Derek later on when he arrives.

Stiles is still hiding by the bed so they can't see him yet and his and his father's scent is all over the room as well so it should be more difficult to find him. He just has to wait for one or more of them to come closer to where he is. He has to wait for just the right moment to launch himself towards them. He has to _hurt_ them, he has to make them bleed, he needs to leave a trail. He's the pink lady in this case trying to out smart the taxi driver and Derek will be his Sherlock Holmes following his clues to find him, hopefully still alive.

He hears one of them take a deep sniff and then there are steps coming towards him. _Shit!_ Slowly, the steps come closer and closer to Stiles. His hands re-grip his makeshift weapons and he slowly eases himself into a pouncing position. _Closer. A little bit closer, just a little bit._

It's not fear that Stiles feels in this moment. It's _anticipation_. There is something deep down within him that feels _elated_. It's in this moment as he waits for the footsteps to come ever closer to him until the moment he can attack that he's cognizance what a predator perceives when waiting for its prey.

It feels like a mini forever before the moment comes that the footsteps are right in front of him. What happens next is a blur of motion and movement as Stiles' head snaps up and he leaps to his feet, the weapon in his left hand comes swinging up and slams into the assailant in front of him's head. The head rocks back to the right and that is when Stiles finally hits with the weapon in his right hand and then kicks out with right leg to push his assailant away from him. He steps away to the right in front of the foot of the bed and can see where the others are as they come running towards him. He sees they aren't human nor werewolves nor even of the creatures he's seen in Portland. These are new creatures with fangs and claws, fur and reptilian and they want him. Stiles grins.

The calm state he entered before they came into the room is still with him as he assesses his situation and knows they are faster, stronger, more blood thirsty than him, and they will hurt him. However, it feels like a distant thought that is automatically pushed to the back of his mind as his hands clench over his weapons and he charges into the fray. 

No thoughts are in his mind as like an automatic defensive response he swings the weapons in his hands against them. Head, chest, legs, arms, anything that was close to him that he could hit he attacked. Eventually, the weapons made of cheap wood break and splinter and he throws the pieces towards his attacks. He runs to one of his weapon stashes and grabs the other legs just as one of them snatches his arm. His swings the other arm with the weapon in it across their forehead. 

On and on it goes, Stiles never knowing if the time was flying fast or slowing down all he could focus on was the creatures as they charged enraged towards him. Hit after hit he fights back against them until like before the weapons break apart. Stiles runs for another weapons stash, the utensils, pens, and pencils this time, and throws them like an expert knife thrower. Stiles never knows if they hit or not as he charges to another part of the room to grab another weapon. All that matters in this very moment is fighting back and using anything and everything he can against them and getting their DNA all over the room. 

It's when he's in the middle of the room when the last of his weapons is taken from him. He grabs the exacto knife from his back pocket and waits for when one of them reaches forward to grab him and slices them.

The next thing that Stiles knows is being smacked back into the door, the exacto knife still in his hand. He knows that this is the moment that he'll lose. He slices his free hand and then charges back aiming to slice or stab one of them. He doesn't know which and it doesn't matter as he's taken down before he can do anything as he's thrown once more across the room. He slams into the wall near where his dad and him ate their food just hours before.

Laying there gasping for breath Stiles realizes he has a choice. Continue to fight and be hurt worse and knocked out. Or pretend that he's hurt worse than he is, dazed, dizzy, confused so that he's able to leave a noticeable trail while they carry him out. He picks the latter, lets his hands go loose, letting go of the exacto knife, closes his eyes, and waits.

Stiles just concentrates on breathing. In and out. In and out. _In and out_. As the footsteps come closer, he finally lets his body go completely limp. He feels one of them pick him up and place him over their shoulder in the fireman carry position. 

He listens as they start to walk towards the door. Judging upon the sounds he hears Stiles thinks that the rest of the group is in front and the person carrying him is at the back. Stiles takes a chance, opens his eyes and tilts his head. He sees several pairs of feet in front of him. He lifts his head a bit to glance behind and realizes he was right. They are at the back. He squeezes the hand he cut and makes sure that there is enough blood on it to leave a solid print. When they come to the door he takes another chance and silently leaves a bloody hand print. 

Stiles looks at the red carpet of the hallway as they walk out and curses silently inside his mind. Blood will be hard to see against the red flooring. Making it difficult to leave a trail but Derek's nose should be able to smell the blood and recognize it as Stiles' considering how many times that Derek's been exposed to it. 

Stiles waits for a count of ten listening to see if they are paying attention to him but they are quiet and focused, so he squeezes his hand sending a drop of blood to the floor. Then he waits for a count of five and does it again. Then another after a count of five, and another and another. He continues to squeeze his hand after a count of five. They come upon a stairwell and Stiles takes a big risk leans his body just slightly over so he can trail his fingers across the walls as they walk down them.

Quickly they reach the first floor and then it's back to a count of five and squeezing his hand for drops of blood to fall upon the floor. Stiles realizes they are coming upon an exit and squeezes his hand repeatedly to make sure there is fresh blood all over his hand. More drops fall on the ground because of this.

Stiles hears the side exit door open and their steps change as their feet hit the concrete ground outside the door. Stiles sees his chance and places his hand upon the wall as they pass by it. He quickly keeps squeezing his hand as they walk across the pavement towards a dark colored van he sees. Stiles plans on placing a print or blood trail upon the vehicle as something for Derek to follow. At least Stiles hopes that Derek can follow it. _Derek, please be able to follow it._

Stiles hears the driver and passenger doors open and then the van door slides open. He hears more than one of them get into the back of the van and then it's their turn and Stiles once more takes his chance to mark a door leaving a trail of his blood for Derek to follow. He tries reaching out as far across the sliding door as he can and trailing his fingertips back to his side. He's jerked to the side and then tossed inside hitting the other side of the van and then sinking to the floor boneless.

Stiles worries that he got caught but nothing else happens. He lays upon his side in the van with his eyes closed, his hand bleeding and surrounded by enemies. He has no idea what happens now. Should he fight? Should he play possum for longer? What happens when they get to their destination? Stiles doesn't know, but he's still not afraid. 

It's strange. Before Portland, back in Beacon Hills, whenever he was in life or death difficulties or just highly stressful ones he would be hyperactive and spazzy. Here, however, in the midst of the worst life or death situation he's ever been in he is perfectly supernaturally calm and thinking of various plans. He's not worried. He's not scared. He's calm. And that terrifies him.

Time passes as the van drives through the city until they reach their destination. Playing possum has been working for him thus far so Stiles chooses to continue with it. The van front doors open and close as they get out. Then the sliding door is opened from the inside and one of them gets out. Stiles knows this because he's dragged by his feet to the opening and then put into another fireman's carry hold. The others who were sitting in the back of the van then pile out after him. Stiles clenches and unclenches his hand as he tries to ease more blood out. The wound was in the process of healing since it wasn't a very deep cut and had stopped bleeding. Stiles thinks it works but he doesn't know for sure since his eyes are closed and he's too worried to open them with the others behind him, watching him.

He hears a door slide open and squints his eyes open taking a quick sly look around him. _Fuck. A warehouse district._ It's typical kidnapping/horror film stuff and Stiles mourns for the lack of ingenuity. Derek should be ashamed that he's following a stereotype with his secret supernatural hideout as well. When Derek rescues him he swears he's going to rib him on that. Just another tick in the 'why Derek Hale can be mistaken as a serial killer' list that Stiles has.

They walk slowly through the warehouse's sliding door with Stiles repeating the breadcrumb trail from the hotel and then the door slams shut.


End file.
